 Pollution emissions and foreign-owned manufacturing plantsJ. Scott Holladay and Justin R. Roush Ecological Economics, 2025, vol. 237, issue C Abstract: We document significant variation in the relative pollution emissions of foreign-owned and domestically owned-manufacturing plants in the U.S. We use a sample of matched plant characteristics and pollution emissions to document the pollution emissions of foreign-owned facilities relative to their competitors in the same industry. On average there is no difference in emissions intensity between domestic- and foreign-owned plants across all manufacturers, but in some industries foreign-owned plants are much cleaner, while in others much dirtier. We show that the variation in relative pollution emissions of foreign-owned manufacturing plants is correlated with industry characteristics: lower industry-level trade costs, higher fixed costs, and lower returns to agglomeration are associated with cleaner foreign-owned plants. These results are consistent with a theoretical framework in which foreign plants have lower productivity, and therefore more pollution intensity, in industries where foreign ownership is more attractive relative to exporting. Keywords: Trade and environment; Firm heterogeneity; Plant-level emissions (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:237:y:2025:i:c:s0921800925001703 DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2025.108687 Access Statistics for this article Ecological Economics is currently edited by C. J. Cleveland More articles in Ecological Economics from Elsevier |
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