Economic Development and the Environment / B. Kelsey Jack, Nicholas Ryan.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Jack, B. Kelsey.

Contributor:

Ryan, Nicholas.

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w34735.

NBER working paper series no. w34735

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2026.

Summary:

Economic development relies on and transforms the environment. The transformation is evident in the poor environmental quality in many developing countries. For example, air quality in Southeast Asia is three times worse than in the United States, in sub-Saharan Africa four times worse and in South Asia more than six times worse. We model how environmental quality affects health, productivity and well-being and how individuals privately adapt to environmental hazards. We also model how collective action and formal regulation contribute to environmental quality. We draw three main findings from a review of empirical research on these mechanisms. First, individual adaptation to environmental hazards is both inadequate as a remedy and inefficiently low. Second, collective action, without the state, to manage resources or address externalities has been outstripped by the scale of environmental problems. Third, state action through formal regulation works better than it looks. Many formal regulations are coarse, poorly targeted and inefficient, but nonetheless yield benefits in excess of their costs.

Notes:

January 2026.

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