THREE ESSAYS ON TRADE, ENVIRONMENT, AND HEALTH

My dissertation consists of three essays on trade, environment and health. The first essay empirically evaluates domestic facilities\u27 environmental response to Chinese import competition in the United States (US) manufacturing sector from 2000 to 2010. Using facility-level data on chemical emissions and employing an instrumental variables approach, the paper finds that industry/regional exposure to increased import competition had very little impact on the environmental decisions of domestic facilities. The second essay empirically explores a possible link between the environmental justice efforts during the Obama administration and the change in environmental inequity by examining the change in US facilities\u27 underlying environmental behavior, focusing on the period at the beginning of Obama administration (2009) and towards the end of the administration (2016). I find that even though environmental inequity existed in both years, there is evidence of reduction in environmental inequity from 2009 to 2016. Specifically, facilities seem to make cleaner environmental decisions with respect to their share of emissions released/recycled, source reduction activities, and exit/entry in high-minority, low-income counties during this period. The third essay investigates whether ambulance quality, measured by patient transportation time, varies by organization type. Using data from the National EMS Information System (NEMSIS) for the years 2010-2015, the paper finds that, on average, ambulance services owned by fire departments respond faster than those managed by other types of ownership. Specifically, fire-department-owned medical emergency services located in urban areas are approximately 17 percent or six minutes faster than those owned by community nonprofit organizations, and are around four to five minutes faster than those owned by other organizations