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As environmental pollution brings a series of problems to society and residential lives, how to effectively reduce air pollution and control climate change have become urgent problems. Since institutional quality is an important factor affecting air quality, we evaluated the causal relationship between them based on cross-country panel data from 2000 to 2016. We find that the improvement of institutional quality significantly reduces PM 2.5 , and this pollution reduction effect is obvious in high-income countries and in countries with common laws. Furthermore, under the components of institutional quality, the quality of government regulation, the degree of rule of law, corruption control, and government effectiveness have significant emission reduction effects. To explore how institutional quality affects air pollution, we perform mechanism analysis from the perspective of economic development, foreign trade, and technology progress. We further verify three environmental propositions including the Environmental Kuznets Curve, the Pollution Paradise Hypothesis, and Porter Hypothesis. Results show that the pollution reduction effect of institutional quality can be mediated by economic development rate, foreign direct investment, and technological progress. The Environmental Kuznets Curve exists, the Pollution Paradise Hypothesis is validated in countries with lower institutional quality level, and the improvement of the institutional quality can achieve the Porter Effect through technological progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Evaluate the effect of environmental pollution on socioeconomic inequality in China. • Employ the recentered influence function regressions with the panel data. • Increasing environmental pollution exposure widens socioeconomic health inequality. • Difference in health behavior of different income group is an important mechanism. • The socioeconomic health inequality effect is larger for the middled-aged. Recent work on socioeconomic health inequality has explored the possible determinants, but there is a lack of empirical evidence examining the associations between environmental pollution and socioeconomic health inequality. Most of studies employed the one-dimensional decomposition method, focusing on health but ignoring rank, to analyze the factors of health inequality. Hence, we fill this gap by using nationally representative individual-level data, employing the recentered influence function regressions method (a two-dimensional decomposition method), and estimating the marginal effect of environmental pollution on socioeconomic inequality in three health outcomes in China straightforward: physical discomfort, chronic disease, and self-rated health. Findings show that environmental pollution increases the income related health inequality of people, and the effect is larger for the middle-aged. The evidence of the possible channel through which environmental pollution is correlated with socioeconomic health inequality is also provided. In the face of environmental pollution, the rich pay more attention to their health condition and increase beneficial health behaviors, such as increasing sleeping hours, decreasing smoking, or having a more balanced diet, compared with the poor. It partly explains why environmental pollution widens the income related health inequality. These findings imply that reducing environmental pollution is an effective strategy for improving environmental quality and narrowing the income related health inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses long range fractional dependence of China pollution in four major cities, namely Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen from September 28 of 2013 to December 12 of 2015. Unit roots hypotheses are tested by using fractional integration methods using both uncorrelated and autocorrelated errors. The results reveal that the pollution is persistent, meaning that it will continue until strong anti-pollution measures are adopted. Policy implication is derived. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]