The impact of public environmental preferences and government environmental regulations on corporate pollution emissions

The Chinese government has attached great importance to pollution emission reduction. Since public environmental preference plays an important role in curbing polluting emissions by companies, this paper aims to explore the impact of public environmental preference and government environmental regulation on corporate pollution emissions. The coordinating role of environmental preference in the implementation of environmental regulatory policies is analyzed using pollution emission data of Chinese enterprises. The results show that both environmental preference and environmental regulation have significant inhibitory effects on corporate pollution emissions. The inhibitory effects are achieved by promoting the green technology progress. With high environmental preference, environmental regulation can effectively curb corporate emissions. This paper is helpful for policy makers to formulate ecological and environmental protection policies and cultivate public environmental preferences. •Environmental preference has inhibitory effect on corporate pollution emissions.•Promoting green technology progress helps inhibiting corporate polluting emissions.•With high environmental preference, environmental regulation can curb emissions.