 Pollution and green innovation: Evidence from CEOs’ early-life experienceNa He, Junjie Yang and Jiahui Ren International Review of Economics & Finance, 2024, vol. 93, issue PA, 65-79 Abstract: This paper examines the impact of CEOs’ early-life exposure to environmental pollution on corporate green innovation. Using a sample of heavily polluting enterprises in China from 2008 to 2021, we find that CEOs who experienced more severe environmental pollution during their childhood are more inclined to promote green innovation. This finding remains robust to various endogeneity and robustness tests. The sensitivity of CEOs to environmental risk can explain this positive relationship. Specifically, the positive effect is more pronounced in companies that invest more in environmental protection and that have higher prevalence of environmental terms in their annual reports. In regions with high environmental regulations, and when led by CEOs with higher levels of education and positive career prospects, the relationship between early-life environmental pollution experience and corporate green innovation is strengthened. Our results contribute to the existing literature regarding the impact of childhood experience on corporate green innovation. Keywords: Environmental pollution; Early-life experience; Green innovation (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:reveco:v:93:y:2024:i:pa:p:65-79 DOI: 10.1016/j.iref.2024.03.015 Access Statistics for this article International Review of Economics & Finance is currently edited by H. Beladi and C. Chen More articles in International Review of Economics & Finance from Elsevier |
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