U.S. Corporate Energy Productivity, Greenhouse Gas Productivity, and Return on Equity

• Main Author: Tate, Terry Geonnie
• Format: Others
• Language: en
• Published: ScholarWorks 2018
• Subjects: CSR; Green; Sustainability; Business; Economics; Finance and Financial Management; Natural Resource Economics
• Online Access: https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/dissertations/5662; https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6941&context=dissertations

Corporate leaders are expected to engage in corporate social responsibility by some stakeholders, but there is no consistent evidence that corporate social performance relates to financial performance. Grounded in instrumental stakeholder theory, the purpose of this correlational study was to examine the relationship among energy productivity, greenhouse gas productivity, and return on equity. The 2016 Newsweek Green Ranking U.S. 500 was the population for this study, which consisted of the largest companies in the United States with the highest corporate social performance scores. The secondary data were collected from Newsweek.com and Morningstar.com for this study. The multiple linear regression was used in the data analysis for the study. This study's model was F(2,104) = 1.028, p = .361, Adjusted R2 = .001 and represented that there was not a statistically significant relationship among energy productivity, greenhouse gas productivity, and return on equity. The implications for positive social change include the potential to provide corporate leaders with additional evidence to inform fact-based decisions related to the strategic allocation of resources to manage corporate energy productivity and greenhouse productivity. Effectively managing energy productivity and greenhouse gas productivity could contribute to reducing global warming, which would improve the quality of lives of U.S residents.