Objective versus Subjective Assessments of Environmental Quality of Standing and Running Waters in a Large City, 1967 Census of Manufactures: Water Use in Manufacturing, National Water Quality Inventory. In part for this reason, we focus on specifications including basin year fixed effects and the interaction of baseline characteristics with year fixed effects. Has Surface Water Quality Improved since the Clean Water Act? These estimates are even less positive than the estimates for housing. We now discuss six reasons the ratios of measured benefits to costs from the previous subsection may provide a lower bound on the true benefit/cost ratio. Our topic is clean water and sanitation. GLS based on the number of underlying pollution readings in each plant downstream year is an efficient response to heteroskedasticity since we have grouped data. Online Appendix FigureVI shows national trends in federal versus state and local spending on wastewater treatment capital over 19601983.21 State and local spending on wastewater treatment capital declined steadily from a total of |${\$}$|43 billion in 1963 to |${\$}$|22 billion in 1971 and then to |${\$}$|7 billion annually by the late 1970s. We now compare the ratio of a grants effect on housing values (its measured benefits) to its costs. These confidence regions do not reject the hypothesis that the ratio of the change in home values to the grants costs is zero but do reject the hypothesis that the change in home values equals the grants costs. Third, if some grant expenditures were lost to rents (e.g., corruption), then those expenditures represent transfers and not true economic costs. A city may spend a grant in years after it is received, so real pass-through may be lower than nominal pass-through. When we fit the change in home values, we do so both for only the balanced panel of tract-years reporting home values, and for all tract-years. Fourth, this analysis abstracts from general equilibrium changes. This predictable spatial variation in the net benefits of water quality variation suggests that allowing the stringency of regulation to vary over space may give it greater net benefits (Muller and Mendelsohn 2009; Fowlie and Muller forthcoming). This chart shows the health benefits of the Clean Air Act programs that reduce levels of fine particles and . Some nutrients like ammonia and phosphorus are declining, while others like nitrates are unchanged. Another possible channel involves ecology. Finally, we interpret our pass-through estimates cautiously because they reflect only 198 cities, do not use upstream waters as a comparison group, and reflect pass-through of marginal changes in investment, rather than the entire Clean Water Act. Dissolved oxygen deficit equals 100 minus dissolved oxygen saturation, measured in percentage points. Season controls are a cubic polynomial in day of year. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites. Municipal spending data from Annual Survey of Governments and Census of Governments. We study |${\$}$|650 billion in expenditure from 35,000 grants the federal government gave cities to improve wastewater treatment plants. The Clean Water Act's grantmaking system creates higher costs than market-based regulations, argue Keiser and Shapiro. Most recent cost-benefit analyses of the Clean Water Act estimate that a substantial share of benefits come from recreation and aesthetics channels (Lyon and Farrow 1995; Freeman 2000; USEPA 2000a). Dissolved oxygen deficit equals 100 minus dissolved oxygen saturation, measured in percentage points. 679 Words. Shapiro thanks fellowships from the EPA, MIT-BP, Martin Family Fellows, the Schultz Fund, the Yale Program on Applied Policy, and NSF Grant SES-1530494 for generous support. All values in billions (|${\$}$|2014). We find suggestive evidence that ratios of measured benefits to costs follow sensible patterns, though not all estimates are precise. The Clean Air Act is a United States federal law designed to control air pollution on a national level. Temperature is increasing by about 1F per 40years, which is consistent with effects from climate change. The Clean Water Act, passed with bipartisan support, was a historic milestone establishing a fundamental right to clean water. Finally, we average this ratio across plants in each county. In 2020, the Clean Air Act Amendments will prevent over 230,000 early deaths. The curve 1 describes the offer function of a firm, and 2 of another firm. Overall, this evidence does not suggest dramatic heterogeneity in cost-effectiveness. Implemented in response to growing public awareness and concern for controlling water pollution in the U.S., the Clean Water Act followed the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the passage of the Clean Air Act in 1970, and preceded the Endangered Species Act of 1973, making it part of a period of landmark . Before The Clean Water Act. The basis of the CWA was enacted in 1948 and was called the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, but the Act was significantly reorganized and expanded in 1972. The definition also includes standards for boating and drinking water that we do not analyze. A blueprint for clean water everywhere, for everyone Sample size in all regressions is 6,336. *The Clean Water Program, which calls for $790 million for municipal-treatment improvements, nonpoint-source-control projects, aquatic-habitat restoration and implementation of management plans. Dollar values in |${\$}$|2014 millions. Under the CWA, EPA has implemented pollution control programs such as setting wastewater standards for industry. TableVI separately lists three types of costs: federal expenditures on capital, local expenditures on capital, and operation and maintenance costs. Effects of Clean Water Act Grants on Water Pollution: Event Study Graphs. This article is published and distributed under the terms of the Oxford University Press, Standard Journals Publication Model (. Online Appendix F discusses other reasons we believe have weaker support. 5 Things To Know About NY's Clean Water, Air, And Green Jobs Bond Act Standard errors are clustered by watershed. Most others are statistically indistinguishable from the mean grant, though there is some moderate (if statistically insignificant) heterogeneity in point estimates. The water can be sea water, sewage water or any other dirty water. The Clean Water Act fight polluted water by adopting a strategy that targets point sources of water pollution. Standard errors are clustered by watershed. Brackets show 95% confidence intervals. The tablet dissolves into the liquid and releases some of the chemicals to purify the water instantly. Swimmable waters must have BOD below 1.5mg/L, dissolved oxygen above 83% saturation (equivalently, dissolved oxygen deficits below 17%), fecal coliforms below 200 MPN/100mL, and TSS below 10mg/L. Parts of the Clean Air Act use cap-and-trade systems, but nearly none of the Clean Water Act does. Online Appendix TableVI shows a variety of sensitivity analyses, and Online Appendix E.2 discusses each. In the presence of such rents, this analysis could be interpreted as a cost-effectiveness analysis from the governments perspective. The top decile of counties includes ratios between 0.31 and 0.41. The last 5% of trips might account for disproportionate surplus because they represent people willing to travel great distances for recreation. The share of waters that are not fishable fell on average by about half a percentage point per year, and the share that are not swimmable fell at a similar rate (TableI, Panel A). An official website of the United States government. They then use the regression estimates from column (4) of TableV to calculate the ratio of the change in the value of housing and grant costs, separately by decile. Pros of legalism are There were much fewer crimes in china and the laws. The historic law was designed to protect all of our waters - from the smallest streams to the mightiest rivers - from pollution and destruction. Data cover decennial census years 19702000. For example, the USEPAs (2000a,b) estimate of the benefit/cost ratio of the Clean Water Act is below 1, though the EPAs preferred estimate of the benefit/cost ratio of the Clean Air Act is 42 (USEPA 1997).28. N1 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; N3 - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and, N4 - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and, N5 - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment, and Extractive, N7 - Transport, Trade, Energy, Technology, and Other, O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and, O3 - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property, Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological, R - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation, R3 - Real Estate Markets, Spatial Production Analysis, and Firm, Z1 - Cultural Economics; Economic Sociology; Economic, II. Official websites use .gov Rainwater monitors that are not in our data record increases of similar magnitude in rainwater pH over this period, and attribute it to declines in atmospheric sulfur air pollution (USEPA 2007). Using a national time series to evaluate the Clean Water Act could imply that it has been counterproductive, since the rate of decrease in pollution slowed after 1972. These pass-through estimates also speak to the broader flypaper literature in public finance, so named to reflect its finding that federal government spending sticks where it hits. Researchers have estimated the pass-through of federal grants to local expenditure in education, social assistance, and other public services. Volume II, Clean Water Construction Grants Program News, Handbook of Procedures: Construction Grants Program for Municipal Wastewater Treatment Works, The Benefits and Costs of the Clean Air Act, 1970 to 1990, A Benefits Assessment of Water Pollution Control Programs Since 1972: Part 1, The Benefits of Point Source Controls for Conventional Pollutants in Rivers and Streams: Final Report, A Retrospective Assessment of the Costs of the Clean Water Act: 1972 to 1997: Final Report, Progress in Water Quality: An Evaluation of the National Investment in Municipal Wastewater Treatment, The National Costs to Implement TMDLs (Draft Report): Support Document 2, The Clean Water and Drinking Water Infrastructure Gap Analysis, ATTAINS, National Summary of State Information, Water Pollution: Information on the Use of Alternative Wastewater Treatment Systems, From Microlevel Decisions to Landscape Changes: An Assessment of Agricultural Conservation Policies, American Journal of Agricultural Economics. The Clean Water Act of 1972 protects the "waters of the United States" from unpermitted discharges that may harm water quality for humans and aquatic life. Analysis includes homes within a given distance of downstream river segments. 1974 Report to the Congress. Choosing Environmental Policy: Comparing Instruments and Outcomes in the United States and Europe, Contingent Valuation: From Dubious to Hopeless, Nor Any Drop to Drink: Public Regulation of Water Quality. How the Clean Water Act Protects Your Rivers - American Rivers Each of the four pollutants which are part of these fishable and swimmable definitions declined rapidly during this period. These full data show more rapid declines before 1972 than after it. Online Appendix E.2 investigates heterogeneity in grants effects on water pollution and cost-effectiveness. What are pros and cons of legalism? 2001; Steinwender, Gundacker, and Wittmann 2008; Artell, Ahtiainen, and Pouta 2013). 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