We suggest a novel perspective on the relationship between the stringency of environmental policies and foreign direct investment (FDI). We develop a political economy model with imperfect product market competition where local and foreign firms jointly lobby the local government for a favorable...

A pressure group model where environmental and industry lobby groups offer political support in return for favorable pollution tax policies is used to explain and predict the equilibrium pollution tax in sectors protected by tariffs. The political economy effects of trade liberalization are...

We suggest a new perspective on firms' ability to organize collective action. We argue that industries that face a greater number of regulations have an easier time forming a lobby group and sustaining joint lobbying efforts. In particular, firms in industries that are pollution intensive, and...

Lobbying by pollution firms is commonly viewed as having a negative impact on the stringency of environmental policy. We ask whether lobbying instead can bring about stricter environmental policy, and how imperfect property rights affect the policy outcome. We study the effects on the...

In this article, we evaluate the role of elections in governors' state tax policy making. Does it matter for state taxes whether the governor is a Democrat or Republican and whether she is eligible for re-election or faces a binding term limit? Using a Regression Discontinuity Design and a panel...

Does environmental lobbying affect the probability of environmental treaty ratification? Does the level of government corruption play a role for the success of such lobbying? In this paper, we propose that a more corruptible government may be more responsive to the demands of the environmental...

The literature on trade liberalization and environment has not considered federal structures. This paper shows how the design of environmental policy in a federal system has implications for the effects of trade reform. Trade liberalization leads to a decline in pollution taxes regardless of...

This article examines the effect of state level corruption on state beer taxes in the United States. Our lobby group model predicts that corruption reduces the beer tax, but this effect is conditional on the level of alcohol-related vehicle deaths. Using a panel of state level data from 1982 to...