1. Green returns to education: Does education affect pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors in China?
- Author
-
Qi Wang, Geng Niu, Xu Gan, and Qiaoling Cai
- Subjects
China ,Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice ,Asia ,Economics ,Climate Change ,Health Status ,Science ,Health Behavior ,Economics of Training and Education ,Social Sciences ,Environment ,Research and Analysis Methods ,Instrumental Variable Analysis ,Education ,Geographical Locations ,Mathematical and Statistical Techniques ,Sociology ,Psychological Attitudes ,Surveys and Questionnaires ,Medicine and Health Sciences ,Humans ,Psychology ,Public and Occupational Health ,Statistical Methods ,Educational Attainment ,Human Capital ,Behavior ,Multidisciplinary ,Schools ,Statistics ,Reproducibility of Results ,Biology and Life Sciences ,Knowledge ,Attitude ,Socioeconomic Factors ,People and Places ,Physical Sciences ,Educational Status ,Regression Analysis ,Medicine ,Behavioral and Social Aspects of Health ,Mathematics ,Research Article - Abstract
Using microdata from the Chinese General Social Survey (CGSS 2010), this paper investigates whether there are green returns to education in China, where educational attainment promotes pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors. We establish causality by exploiting the exogenous variation induced by the implementation of the Compulsory Schooling Law (CSL) in China. We find evidence that educational attainment is associated with higher levels of pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors, and these estimates are robust to various robustness checks. Further analysis reveals that the acquisition of environmental knowledge is the channel that drives the effect of education on pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors. Finally, the effects of education are heterogeneous across individuals.
- Published
- 2022