The main purpose of the paper is to identify and analyse a correlation between excessive air pollution, well-being and the cost of living. The analysis was performed using spatial panel models. Two research hypotheses were confirmed. One assumed a negative impact of excessive air degradation on the level of socio-economic development. The other concerned an increase in the cost of living due to air pollution. 32 selected European countries were studied from 1990 to 2009. The level of socio-economic well-being was expressed by measures of the GDP per capita and HDI. The cost of living was presented by means of a measure designed by the author – COSTS. Air quality was expressed in terms of SO2, CO, NOx, GHG, CO2 and a constructed synthetic measure – AIRQ.
PL
Głównym celem publikacji jest identyfikacja i analiza zależności pomiędzy nadmiernym zanieczyszczeniem powietrza a poziomem jakości życia (dobrobytem społeczno-ekonomicznym, kosztami życia). Analizę przeprowadzono z zastosowaniem przestrzennych modeli panelowych. Weryfikacji poddano dwie hipotezy badawcze. Jedna zakłada negatywny wpływ nadmiernej degradacji powietrza na poziom dobrobytu społeczno-ekonomicznego. Druga mówi o wzroście kosztów życia z powodu zanieczyszczeń atmosfery. Badanie dotyczyło wybranych 32. państw Europy i okresu czasowego od 1990 do 2009 roku. Poziom jakości życia wyrażony został: PKB per capita, indeksem HDI oraz skonstruowanym miernikiem COSTS. Jakość powietrza wyrażono w: SO2, GHG, CO2 oraz skonstruowanym miernikiem syntetycznym AIRQ.
The aim of this paper is the presentation of a spatial panel models appli- cation to analyzing the level of sustainable development realization in 32. European Countries. This type of spatial models has not been used in Poland in this field of re- search. Models construction was based on Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis. It assumes the existence of a relationship between various indicators of environmental degradation and income per capita. In the early stages of economic growth pollution increases. However, above a certain level of high income per capita high-income levels economic growth leads to environmental improvement. This implies that the environ- mental impact indicator is an inverted U-shaped function of income per capita. Selected statistics tools to present the phenomena were also used The data include the years from 1990 to 2006. According to the existence of spatial autocorrelation and results obtained from both parts of the research, assessment and comparison analysis of sustainable development level in Europe were conducted.
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