The impacts of China's dual carbon policy on green innovation: Evidence from Chinese heavy-polluting enterprises.

Encouraging enterprises to engage in green innovation is a potent strategy for reducing carbon emissions from production. As one of the largest carbon emitters, China has launched a series of policies to achieve carbon peaking and neutrality collectively referred to as China's dual carbon policy. However, existing research on the impact of China's dual carbon policy on green innovation by heavy-polluting enterprises is insufficient. To fill this gap, this study constructed a theoretical model to draw hypotheses about the impact of the dual carbon policy on enterprises' green innovation and verified this impact using a difference-in-differences model to conduct a quasi-natural experiment based on data from 2010 to 2022 from Chinese A-share-listed enterprises. The results indicate that the dual carbon policy had a significantly positive influence on green innovation in heavy-polluting enterprises. Moreover, environmental tax mediated this effect, while enterprises' total costs and subsidies positively moderated it. Additionally, the impact exhibited variations based on several key factors, including green patent type, carbon emissions, enterprise ownership structure, and Environmental, Social, and Governance ratings. This study supplements related research on the effects of environmental policy on green innovation and provides both theoretical and empirical support for adapting subsequent environmental policies.

Carbon Trading in China Reduces the Dependence of Household Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Recycling on Government Subsidies.

China's enterprises of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) recycling suffer from low profitability that is highly dependent on government subsidies. This low economic gain impedes the sustainable growth of China's WEEE-recycling sector and also adds to the government's financial burden. Prior life-cycle studies have approved the carbon reduction potentials or net carbon credit of recycling WEEE. However, policymakers fail to know whether the revenue from selling carbon credits can offset the government's financial subsidy. We performed life-cycle and cost-benefit analyses for a case recycling enterprise that processes six categories of household appliances. The results show that the reduction potentials of greenhouse gases range from 930-3450 kgCO2e by recycling per ton of household appliances and materials substitution. The recycling enterprise would gain extra revenue ranging from 32 to 160 RMB per ton of appliance if the carbon credits were sold at China's current carbon price, i.e., 45-60 RMB tCO2e-1. Recycling waste refrigerators exhibits the highest carbon revenue, offsetting 6-17% of the government's financial subsidy. Microcomputers, by contrast, indicate the lowest carbon revenue, equivalent to 1-3% of its highest government subsidy. For each household appliance category, when the carbon price reaches 270-600 RMB tCO2e-1, selling carbon credits can fully offset the government's financial subsidy. Constrained by the processing capacity of the case enterprise, optimizations for appliance-recycling composition contribute a 15-25% profit growth to the current economic gains. Interpreting the specific profit depends on the predefined scenarios of carbon price and the substitution rate of the regenerated materials for the virginal ones. Our findings show that raising the profitability of WEEE recycling enterprises through the carbon trading policy contributes to the sustainable growth of China's WEEE-recycling sector while alleviating the government's financial burden.

Intermodal transportation hub location optimization with governments subsidies under the Belt and Road Initiative.

Driven by globalization, the COVID-19 outbreak has severely impacted global transport and logistics systems. To better cope with this globalization crisis, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)-based on the concept of cooperation-is more important than ever in the post-pandemic era. Taking the BRI as the background, we design an intermodal hub-and-spoke network to provide reference for governments along BRI routes to improve their cross-border transportation system and promote economic recovery. In the context of the BRI, local governments at different nodes have incentives to subsidize hub construction and/or rail transportation to boost economic development. We consider co-opetition behavior among different levels of government caused by subsidies in this intermodal hub location problem, which we call the intermodal hub location problem based on government subsidies. We establish a two-stage mixed-integer programming model. In the first stage, local governments provide subsidies, then the central government decides the number and location of hubs. In the second stage, freight carriers choose the optimal route to transport the goods. To solve the model, we design an optimization method combining a population-based algorithm using contest theory. The results show that rail subsidies are positively correlated with construction subsidies but are not necessarily related to the choice of hubs. Compared with monomodal transportation, intermodal transportation can reduce costs more effectively when there are not too many hubs and the cost of different modes of transportation varies greatly. The influences of local government competition and hub construction investment on network design and government subsidies are further examined.

Access to denture restoration services under removable dentures subsidy program for adults aged 65 years and older in Taiwan- an interpretive approach.

BACKGROUND: Access is an important issue in health equality. Availability of dental services and cost subsidies is an important factor affecting access to denture restoration for the elderly. This study aims to explore access to denture restoration services in the elderly removable denture's subsidy program of  Taiwan. METHODS: Access to the elderly removable dentures subsidy program was measured from two aspects, that is, availability of subsidies and payment for these services and the characteristics of patients and their treatment needs. The first aspect included reimbursements and the number and location of subsidy clinics, and the second aspect included the age and gender distribution of patients and denture types. Information on reimbursement regulations and the number and location of dental clinics providing subsidized services were obtained from the website of the Taoyuan City Public Health Bureau, Taoyuan Hospital, Department of Statistics and Ministry of Health and Welfare. Data on patient characteristics and denture type were obtained through a retrospective survey. We selected individuals who participated in the elderly removable denture's subsidy program from 2015 to 2018 at the Geriatric Dentistry Department of Taoyuan Hospital. We conducted data analysis using an interpretive approach. RESULTS: This study found that reimbursement amounts are inadequate, and the availability of subsidized services is low. Moreover, the proportion of male applications is slightly higher than that of females. In addition, among the applicants, removable partial dentures for single or two arches are the most common. CONCLUSIONS: Problems of insufficient numbers of contracted hospitals and low reimbursement amounts are observed in the subsidy program, which are the key factors affecting access to denture restoration services among the elderly. Policymakers should exclude wealthy individuals and offer subsidy only to low-income elderly individuals with missing teeth who are in dire need of financial support to improve their dental health.

Research on Carbon Emissions Reduction Strategy Considering Government Subsidy and Free Riding Behavior.

Government subsidy can greatly encourage supply chain enterprises to reduce carbon emissions. To quickly occupy the market, supply chain enterprises form alliances. However, enterprises in the alliance have speculative psychology, and the impact of such free riding behavior on the carbon emissions reduction willingness of supply chain enterprises is still unclear. In this article, government subsidies and free riding behavior parameters are introduced to build a carbon emissions reduction decision model for the government, manufacturers, and suppliers, and the impact of government subsidies and free riding behavior on the decision making of supply chain enterprises is analyzed through evolutionary game theory. The analysis shows that government subsidies have an incentive effect on carbon emissions reduction of supply chain enterprises. After the market stabilizes, even if the government subsidies are gradually withdrawn, the carbon emissions reduction of supply chain enterprises still converges to Pareto optimal equilibrium. The influence of free riding behavior on supply chain enterprises depends on the carbon emissions reduction profit. When the carbon emissions reduction profit is different, the decision of manufacturers and suppliers will be different. The above conclusions provide a reference for governments to strengthen control or enterprises to make decisions on carbon emissions reduction.

Optimal subsidy policies of the Chinese cruise market under the impact of COVID-19.

The spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has caused severe damage to the Chinese cruise market since 2020. It is crucial for the local government to reformulate the subsidy policy to respond to the changing environment. We propose a cruise supply chain system to investigate the choice of subsidy recipients and the setting of optimal subsidy levels with a budget-constrained government during the access restriction period and post-epidemic period. We find that in both periods, as long as the subsidy achieves the optimal level, either the cruise lines, the travel agency, or the passengers as recipients of the subsidy policy can maximize the market demand and recover the cruise market after the COVID-19 outbreak. However, as the budget increases, subsidizing passengers can improve the "low price dilemma" of the Chinese cruise market. Compared with the access restriction period, the local government should adjust the subsidy level in the post-epidemic period. Interestingly, the subsidy policy does not always positively impact the international cruise line's profit in the post-epidemic period.

Health Insurance and Health Status: Exploring the Causal Effect from a Policy Intervention.

Whether health insurance matters for health has long been a central issue for debate when assessing the full value of health insurance coverage in both developed and developing countries. In 2007, the government-led Urban Resident Basic Medical Insurance (URBMI) program was piloted in China, followed by a nationwide implementation in 2009. Different premium subsidies by government across cities and groups provide a unique opportunity to employ the instrumental variables estimation approach to identify the causal effects of health insurance on health. Using a national panel survey of the URBMI, we find that URBMI beneficiaries experience statistically better health than the uninsured. Furthermore, the insurance health benefit appears to be stronger for groups with disadvantaged education and income than for their counterparts. In addition, the insured receive more and better inpatient care, without paying more for services. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Subsidy and parental attitudes toward pediatric health care in the Tokyo metropolitan area.

BACKGROUND: In Japan, the number of municipalities that offer free medical care for children has increased. This policy, however, might unintentionally aggravate the overcrowded situation of pediatric ambulatory services in Japan. We investigated the relationship between parents' health-care seeking attitudes according to child symptom severity and the amount of copayment, as well as parents' socioeconomic and demographic factors. METHODS: We used data for 4385 people from the Japanese Study of Stratification, Health, Income and Neighborhood (J-SHINE), which consisted of stratified random sampling of those aged from 25 to 50 years who lived in Tokyo and neighboring areas. Outcome variables were respondent health-care seeking attitudes toward their children's mild and severe symptoms of cold. Logistic regression models were developed for each dependent variable. RESULTS: A total of 1606 respondents with one or more children under the age of 15 years were included in the analysis. For mild symptoms of cold, no subsidy (OR: 0.51, 95%CI: 0.38-0.69) and partial subsidy (OR, 0.71; 95%CI: 0.54-0.95) were associated with fewer "visit on that day" answers, compared with full subsidy. Income and respondent educational level were not associated with the outcome. For severe symptoms of cold, the OR of no subsidy (0.61; 95%CI: 0.30-1.23) and that of partial subsidy (0.91; 95%CI: 0.40-2.07) were not statistically significant. CONCLUSION: Imposing a small copayment might prevent visits to medical facilities for mild symptoms of cold, but will not prevent visits for severe symptoms of cold.

Evolutionary game analysis between regional governments and shipping companies: Considering the impact of government subsidy on shipping companies.

Maritime agencies are imposing stricter limits on fuel sulfur content, and regional governments are encouraging the reduction of various emissions through subsidies. In this study, an evolutionary game model is constructed to analyze the interaction between regional governments and shipping companies under the fixed and dynamic subsidies. The sensitivity analysis reveals the effect of parameters on stabilization strategies. The results show that the bilateral stakeholders can adopt stabilization strategies under dynamic subsidies. The fines, maximum subsidies and extra cost paid by regional governments have a significant impact on these strategies. To reduce the dependence of shipping companies on subsidy policies, it is recommended to improve the LSFO refining technology in the future. Expanding the implementation scope of LSFO subsidy policies will increase the utilization of LSFO by shipping companies. This study offers insights for governments to optimize the LSFO subsidy policy and shipping companies to choose sulfur oxides reduction approaches.

Green credit policy, government subsidy, and enterprises "shifting from virtual to real".

Taking the green credit policy in 2012 as a quasi-natural experiment, this paper uses the difference-in-differences method to explore the impact of green credit policy on enterprises' financial asset allocation and the moderating effect of government subsidy. We find that green credit policy significantly promotes the financial asset allocation of heavy-polluting enterprises, which is mainly reflected in short-term liquid financial investment, thus supporting the precautionary motivation of holding financial assets. The mechanism analysis shows that green credit policy promotes the financial asset allocation of heavy-polluting enterprises by reducing the scale of debt financing and increasing the financing cost. Government subsidy can significantly weaken the promoting effect of green credit policy on enterprises' financial asset allocation, and there is heterogeneity due to the regional environmental regulation intensity and financial development level. Further analysis shows that the negative moderating effect of government subsidy on green credit policy and enterprises' financial asset allocation significantly promotes the "shifting form virtual to real" of heavy polluting enterprises by reducing financial asset allocation. This paper discusses the impact of green credit policy on financial asset allocation of heavy-polluting enterprises in China and further clarifies the significant role of government subsidy in the process, so as to provide suggestions for government to control the "shifting from real to virtual" of enterprises. The results also provide an important reference for countries, especially developing countries, to implement green credit policy and government subsidy to achieve sustainable economic development.

The government subsidy design considering the reference price effect in a green supply chain.

This paper constructs a green supply chain with a manufacturer and a retailer. Taking into account the reference price effect of consumers based on the mental accounting theory, we investigate the following government incentive policies: R&D (research and development) subsidy, consumption subsidy, and dual subsidy. For manufacturer-led (M-led) and retailer-led (R-led) supply chains, we evaluate the optimal wholesale price, sales price, green degree of product, and the optimal subsidy of the government aiming to improve the environmental benefit or social welfare. We find that the government goal, power structure and reference price effect impact the design of subsidy mechanisms significantly. First, for M-led supply chain, the government concerned with the environmental benefit goal should only provide R&D subsidy for the manufacturer when the reference price effect is low; otherwise, the government would offer subsidy both for the manufacturer and consumers. However, the government will only offer R&D subsidy when the social welfare goal is adopted. Second, for R-led supply chain, the government aiming to improve the environmental benefit prefers dual subsidy when the reference price effect is low; otherwise, consumption subsidy is preferable. Surprisingly, under the social welfare goal, no subsidy for R-led supply chain tends to be the best option. Intriguingly, embracing the social welfare goal can result in more economic and environmental benefits for M-led supply chain, although the subsidy strategy is less effective than the environmental benefit goal. Our research can provide inspirations and references for designing government subsidy mechanisms in practice.

Regulating CEO pay and green innovation: moderating role of social capital and government subsidy.

The Chinese government has implemented the policies to regulate executive (CEO) pay in state-owned enterprises (SOEs) with the aim of promoting wage equality. This study examines whether these policies affect the motivation of CEOs to engage in green innovation (GI). By analyzing data from Chinese listed SOEs between 2008 and 2017, the study reveals an unintended environmental consequence of regulating CEO pay. We found a negative causal relationship between regulating CEO pay and GI. Moreover, we provide evidence that social capital act as a mitigating factor promotes cooperation and a shared sense of responsibility towards sustainable practices. Additionally, government subsidies provide financial incentives and support for businesses to invest in sustainable practices and technologies, which can offset the negative impact of CEO pay regulation on GI. The results of this study offer policy recommendations to encourage sustainable environmental initiatives; the government should increase its support for GI and introduce new incentives for managers. Overall the study findings are robust and remain valid even after conducting rigorous testing with instrumental variables and other robustness checks.

The environmental, economic, and social influences of government subsidies on express delivery packaging supply chain.

The rapid development of e-commerce and the prosperity of express delivery has brought great convenience to people's life. However, the environmental and social problems caused by express delivery packaging (EDP) have not been well understood yet. It has become an important issue to coordinate the economic, environmental, and social development goals of the government for the sustainable development of the EDP. This paper adopted the system dynamics (SD) method to simulate three subsystems in the express delivery packaging supply chain (EDPSC), i.e., the manufacturer subsystem, the consumer subsystem, and the recycler subsystem. Particularly, the impact of government subsidies on the EDPSC from three dimensions of economy, environment, and society was discussed in this paper. The results showed that (1) CO2 emissions in the end-of-life stage of EDPSC account for about 83.9-91.8%, and incineration as the main carbon emission source of end-of-life reduce by 10-19% compared with no government subsidy. (2) The profit of recyclers is most affected by government subsidies, and incineration power generation is one of the main economic sources for recyclers. As the recycling rate of EDP increased from 2 to 32%, the income from incineration power generation decreased from about 25-40% to 15-25% of the total income. (3) The implementation of government subsidies is beneficial to improve social welfare, which has the biggest impact on consumers' surplus. (4) The comprehensive scenario subsidy is better than the single scenario subsidy, but it will bring a serious cost burden to the government. In the single scenario, the target of government subsidy depends on the level of government subsidy, which is subsidized to consumers at low and medium levels and recyclers at high levels. Therefore, our results can be used to help governments make decisions and also serve as a methodological reference for supply chains in other industries.

The heterogeneous impacts of government on health system efficiency in China's new health reform, 2010-2019.

BACKGROUND: Contextualizing in China's recent health reform, we empirically explore the heterogeneous effects of two distinct government roles, accommodating private hospitals vs investing in public hospitals, on health system efficiency. METHODS: We use panel data covering 31 provinces during 2010-2019 to assess health system efficiency. We incorporate health service volumes and population health outcomes to ascertain health system outputs, employing the non-radial directional distance function to estimate efficiency. We employ Bayesian Tobit quantile regression to explore the heterogeneous effects of the share of private hospitals and government subsidy to public providers on efficiency. RESULTS: China's health system inefficiency scores range from 0 to 0.45. The association between the share of private hospitals and inefficiency score are only significant in higher-inefficiency quantiles (coefficients -0.0258, -0.0315 and -0.0327 for quantiles 0.7, 0.8 and 0.9), meaning a heterogeneously positive impact for low-efficiency provinces. The association between government subsidy and inefficiency score are positive for all quantiles (from 0.0339 to 0.0567), meaning persistent negative impacts on efficiency. CONCLUSIONS: The heterogeneous impacts of the share of private hospitals suggest that the government should accommodate more private hospitals in provinces with low efficiency. The persistent negative impacts of government subsidy suggest that the government investment seems not be subjected to economic objectives.

Exploring the strategies of online and offline recycling channels in closed-loop supply chain under government subsidy.

The influence of online and offline dual recycling channels in a closed-loop supply chain (CLSC) is investigated in our work. The CLSC models of three recycling modes (single online recycling, single offline recycling, and dual recycling channels of online and offline) are established, respectively, and the impact of government subsidies on the pricing decision-making and recycling mode selection of channel members is therefore researched. The study found that the remanufacturer sets appropriate recycling price and transfer price to coordinate online and offline recycling channels and maximize its profits in the dual recycling modes; collector's offline recycling faces the competitive threat of remanufacturers' online recycling under the dual recycling modes, so the collector prefers a single offline recycling mode; the relationship between the collection quantities of the three modes depends on consumers' preference of the online recycling channel. In the meanwhile, it is illustrated that government subsidy plays a positive role in promoting the recycling and remanufacturing willingness of remanufacturers and collectors. This work provides practical insights for the CLSC system to make recycle decisions.

Does government subsidy stimulate or shackle new energy industry efficiency? Evidence from China.

During 2013-2017, the new energy industry in China experienced prosperous growth with the financing support of the government. To evaluate the real performance of this industry and the government subsidy effect during this period, this paper measures both the original and adjusted industry efficiencies and investigates the non-linear impact of the government subsidy. Applying a four-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) method to a sample of listed companies during 2013-2017, we find that: (1) China's new energy industry obtains relatively a high efficiency while showing a noticeable decline after a rising trend; (2) the industry efficiency presents a downward adjustment after eliminating the environmental factors; (3) a single threshold of government subsidy is identified, indicating a shackle after a short-term positive impact; (4) the positive mediating effect of cash flow and R&D investments are identified; and whereas the management self-interest presents a negative mediating effect, (5) the regional and ownership endogeneity of the government subsidy effect are recognized.

'Guidance' or 'Misleading'? The government subsidy and the choice of enterprise innovation strategy.

Government subsidies have a direct impact on firms' innovation strategies. The game relationship between the government, the subsidized firm and its competitors under different subsidy strategies affects firms' innovation behavior and thus innovation performance. This paper uses a dynamic evolutionary game theory approach based on cost-benefit differences to analyse the mechanisms by which government subsidy strategies affect firms' innovation strategies. It is found that the marginal benefits of a firm's innovation strategy will directly affect the game outcome, indicating that the choice of innovation strategy depends on the maximization of individual firm's interests. At the same time, a firm's innovation strategy is influenced by the firm's own innovation ability and competitors' innovation strategy, and there are two game equilibria. Government subsidies have a positive contribution to the innovation strategy choice of subsidized firms, but have a crowding-out effect on non-subsidized competing firms. The strength of the penalty (the efficiency of the implementation of government subsidies), the marginal revenue of the subsidized firms' rational use of government subsidies and the competitors' strategic choices will directly affect the game outcome.

Impact of Carbon Tax and Subsidy Policies on Original Equipment Manufacturers and Remanufacturing Companies from the Perspective of Carbon Emissions.

To analyze the impact of government carbon tax and subsidy policies on the manufac turing industry in the context of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality. This paper constructs a game model based on two government policies: a "carbon tax" policy for the original product and a "subsidy" policy for the remanufactured product, taking the original product and the remanufactured product as the objects. The policy game model is used to study the impact of carbon taxes, government subsidies, and carbon emissions on product quality, sales, and corporate profits. The results show that under the carbon tax and government subsidy policies, the price of remanufactured products will decrease, the quality will increase, sales will improve, and remanufacturers' profits will increase; these outcomes are conducive to the development of remanufacturing enterprises. Meanwhile, the price of original products will increase, quality will decrease, sales will decline, and original equipment manufacturers will have to develop and adopt low-carbon technologies to achieve sustainable development. This paper provides decision support for the formulation of government carbon emission policy, and theories and methods for the sustainable development of the manufacturing industry.

Personal protective equipment market coordination using subsidy.

During a pandemic, various resources, including personal protective equipment (PPE), are required to protect people and healthcare workers from getting infected. Due to the high demand and limited supply chain, countries experience a shortage in PPE products. This global crisis imposes a decline in the international trade of PPE supplies. In fact, most governments implement a localization strategy motivating domestic manufacturers to pivot their operations to respond to PPE demands. An oligopolistic market cannot reach the socially optimal coverage without government subsidies. On the other hand, the government subsidy pays the proportion of production costs to reach the socially optimal coverage, while the government's budget is limited. Therefore, the government collaborates with manufacturers via procurement contracts to increase the supply of PPE products. We propose the first supply chain model of PPE products that investigates manufacturer costs and government expenditure. We consider how different behavioral aspects of manufacturers and government can self-organize towards a system optimum. Additionally, we integrate the consumer surplus, producer surplus, and societal surplus into the game model to maximize social benefit. A cost-sharing contract under the system optimum between government and manufacturers is designed to increase the production of PPEs and hence, helps in reducing the number of infected individuals. We conducted our computational study on real data generated from the mask usage during the Covid-19 pandemic in Los Angeles (LA) County to respond to the reported PPE shortage. Under the socially optimal strategy, the PPE coverage increases by up to 33%, and the number of infected individuals reduces by up to 30% compared to other strategies.

Impact of government subsidy on the remanufacturing industry.

In order to decrease environment pollution and the usage of raw material, some governments use subsidy policy to encourage the Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) and the Independent Remanufacturer (IR) to remanufacture. While, how government subsidy affects remanufacturing activity and industry competition is still unclear. In our research, there are an OEM and an IR in the market. And the OEM and the IR have three different choices of remanufacturing: no-remanufacturing, remanufacturing part, and remanufacturing all. This research builds a game-theoretic model to discuss the impact of government subsidy on manufacturing and remanufacturing quantities, consumer surplus, OEM and IR profit, social surplus and environment for each choice of the OEM and the IR. The result shows that the amount of the OEM remanufacturing decreases with government subsidy when the OEM remanufactures all but the IR remanufactures part. OEM and IR profit, and consumer surplus may decrease with government subsidy in some competitive markets. Total social surplus may also decrease in government subsidy when OEM-IR competition exists in a remanufactured market or only the IR remanufactures part. The change of the total environment impact depends on the relative environment impact of unit manufactured and remanufactured product when OEM or IR remanufactures part. Thus, it is not always a great strategy for policy makers to only increase government subsidy in order to decrease environment pollution and improve social surplus. Before increasing government subsidy, policy makers need to more learn about the competitive markets and environment impact per unit product. Finally, numerical study is conducted to confirm these findings, discuss what happens when the willingness-to-pay of consumers for remanufactured products changes, and analyze the impact of different levels of environment impact per remanufactured product on total environment.