Industrial growth, health care policy uncertainty and carbon emissions: Do trade and tax policy uncertainties matter for sustainable development in the USA?

Abstract

With the increasing policy uncertainties and the need for shielding environmental degradation among countries, understanding the connection between policy uncertainty and carbon emissions becomes necessary. This study aims to explore impacts of policy uncertainties (health care uncertainty, tax and trade policy uncertainties and others) on environmental sustainability. This objective is realized by exploring the symmetric and asymmetric impacts of industrialization and nine types of policy uncertainties on CO2 emissions in the United States of America by using augmented STIRPAT model on monthly data spanning between January 2000 and October 2021. The nature of short-term and long-term effects are explored by using ARDL model along with NARDL and MTNARDL models. The findings reveal that policy uncertainty variables have asymmetric short term and long-term impact on carbon emissions. Furthermore, industrialization reveal negative, while energy consumption shows significant positive impact on CO2 emissions. This study's outcome demands dynamic approaches in carbon emissions policies to incorporate tax, health care, trade, and government policy uncertainties. Policymakers should pay cautious attention to the growing instabilities of different policies irrespective of the economic condition for sustainable development.