Working Time, Inequality and Carbon Dioxide Emissions: Longitudinal Analysis of High-Income OECD Countries

• In Event: 2251 - Section on Environmental Sociology Roundtables (1 hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 4. Emissions and Economic Growth: State and National Trends and Comparisons

Abstract

The relationship between economic growth and environmental pressures is quite clear: more growth results in increased pressures. Recent research has begun to move beyond the longstanding discussion surrounding the relationship between economic growth and environmental pressures by examining how structural economic factors, which are important components of economic growth, are related to environmental harms. Two examples of this are studies on the relationship between income and wealth inequality and carbon dioxide emissions and the relationship between working hours and various environmental outcomes. In this paper, I seek to bring together these two related areas of literature. I examine the ways in which working hours and inequality interact to affect carbon dioxide emissions in high income OECD countries. These preliminary results show that the interactive effect of inequality and working hours is positive and statistically significant. This indicates two possibilities: 1. When inequality is higher, the effect of working hours on carbon dioxide emissions is larger. 2. When working hours are longer, the effect of inequality on emissions is larger.

Author

• Jared Fitzgerald, Boston College