Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures

Although the prevailing viewpoint claims that corporate profitability and environmental regulation are directly at odds, there is a growing base of evidence suggesting that low-carbon companies gain a strategic advantage over dirtier competitors by lobbying for more stringent climate regulations. Th...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Brussell, Alexander
Format: Others
Published: Scholarship @ Claremont 2018
Subjects:
ESG
Online Access:https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/2021
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3136&context=cmc_theses
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spelling ndltd-CLAREMONT-oai-scholarship.claremont.edu-cmc_theses-31362019-10-16T03:05:01Z Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures Brussell, Alexander Although the prevailing viewpoint claims that corporate profitability and environmental regulation are directly at odds, there is a growing base of evidence suggesting that low-carbon companies gain a strategic advantage over dirtier competitors by lobbying for more stringent climate regulations. This paper extends previous analyses of corporate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and lobbying using toxic releases as a measure of environmental performance to assess the assertion that both clean and dirty firms disproportionately lobby on environmental policies. In my analysis, I find that the same relationship previously found using GHG emissions as a measure of corporate environmental performance holds with toxic releases when examining only the three most widely represented industries in my data—Major Chemical, Power Generation, and Energy Utilities. When combined with findings of a negative linear correlation between firms’ toxic releases and lobbying expenditures using the same sample, my results suggest that clean firms in these industries not only lobby frequently on environmental policies—they actually do so more aggressively than their dirtier competitors. While I deduce that these results are caused by clean firms lobbying for stricter environmental regulations that impose costly compliance costs on dirty competitors, it is evident that my data do not specify if firms are lobbying for or against more stringent regulations or what the implications of those lobbied policies would entail. This inability to distinguish firms’ underlying motivations for lobbying is a fundamental shortcoming of my analysis. 2018-01-01T08:00:00Z text application/pdf https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/2021 https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3136&context=cmc_theses 2018 Alexander S Brussell CMC Senior Theses Scholarship @ Claremont environmental regulation lobbying public policy corporate strategy ESG toxic pollution Economics Environmental Studies
collection NDLTD
format Others
sources NDLTD
topic environmental regulation
lobbying
public policy
corporate strategy
ESG
toxic pollution
Economics
Environmental Studies
spellingShingle environmental regulation
lobbying
public policy
corporate strategy
ESG
toxic pollution
Economics
Environmental Studies
Brussell, Alexander
Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
description Although the prevailing viewpoint claims that corporate profitability and environmental regulation are directly at odds, there is a growing base of evidence suggesting that low-carbon companies gain a strategic advantage over dirtier competitors by lobbying for more stringent climate regulations. This paper extends previous analyses of corporate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and lobbying using toxic releases as a measure of environmental performance to assess the assertion that both clean and dirty firms disproportionately lobby on environmental policies. In my analysis, I find that the same relationship previously found using GHG emissions as a measure of corporate environmental performance holds with toxic releases when examining only the three most widely represented industries in my data—Major Chemical, Power Generation, and Energy Utilities. When combined with findings of a negative linear correlation between firms’ toxic releases and lobbying expenditures using the same sample, my results suggest that clean firms in these industries not only lobby frequently on environmental policies—they actually do so more aggressively than their dirtier competitors. While I deduce that these results are caused by clean firms lobbying for stricter environmental regulations that impose costly compliance costs on dirty competitors, it is evident that my data do not specify if firms are lobbying for or against more stringent regulations or what the implications of those lobbied policies would entail. This inability to distinguish firms’ underlying motivations for lobbying is a fundamental shortcoming of my analysis.
author Brussell, Alexander
author_facet Brussell, Alexander
author_sort Brussell, Alexander
title Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
title_short Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
title_full Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
title_fullStr Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
title_full_unstemmed Pollution and Persuasion: An Investigation of Corporate Toxic Releases and Lobbying Expenditures
title_sort pollution and persuasion: an investigation of corporate toxic releases and lobbying expenditures
publisher Scholarship @ Claremont
publishDate 2018
url https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/2021
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3136&context=cmc_theses
work_keys_str_mv AT brussellalexander pollutionandpersuasionaninvestigationofcorporatetoxicreleasesandlobbyingexpenditures
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