Empirical Analysis on How Financial Development Influences Low-Carbon Economic Gain Efficiency Considering the Panel Data of Yangtze River Economic Corridor

Abstract

This paper establishes an evaluation metric system (EMS) for low-carbon economic gain efficiency (LCEGE) containing the carbon sink element, and measures the LCEGEs in the 11 provincial administrative regions in the Yangtze River Economic Corridor (YREC) of 2000-2017 with the directional distance function (DDF) model. Furthermore, the Tobit model was selected for the empirical analysis on the influence of financial development on LCEGE. The results show that: the provinces in YREC had certain disparities in LCEGE. Most provinces achieved desirable LCEGEs, but a few provinces failed to do so. The LCEGE in the lower part changed little in the target period, while that in the middle part and upper part varied in two phases. Besides, there are obvious differences in the mean LCEGE between the lower part, middle part, and upper part. In the target period, the three parts of the YREC can be ranked as lower part, middle part, and upper part by LCEGE. The results of Tobit model reveal that the LCEGE in the YREC can be greatly promoted by financial scale, and clearly suppressed by financial structure. Among the control variables, foreign direct investment significantly promotes LCEGE; technical innovation, and energy structure significantly suppresses LCEGE; industrial structure and environmental regulation have an insignificant influence on LCEGE.