房价控制与工业污染：来自房地产市场乱象治理的证据

Abstract

In recent years, the central government has been resolutely regulating the real estate market, which has changed the expectations of economic agents regarding the continued rise in housing prices. The way in which local governments have been responding to the cooling trend of the real estate market is worthy of in-depth study. Drawing on the quasi-experiment of the 'Special Action to Control Chaos in the Real Estate Market' policy implemented from July to December 2018, this paper uses the difference-in-differences approach to identify the impact of housing price control policies on regional environmental pollution. Empirical results reveal that the policy implementation significantly reduces the level of housing prices in the pilot cities and increases the degree of industrial pollution in the pilot areas. A more detailed analysis indicates that to cope with the negative impact on land finance likely caused by housing price control, local governments relaxed environmental oversight to develop industries, which eventually led to an increase in industrial pollution. Nonetheless, the promotion of regional innovation can reduce the economic incentive of local governments to sacrifice environmental protection objectives, and the strengthening of external environmental regulation can reinforce the motivation of local governments to protect the environment, both of them will help curb the unintended polluting effects that housing price control may produce.