Government environmental protection subsidies, environmental tax collection, and green innovation: evidence from listed enterprises in China

The government has issued a series of environmental laws and regulations to solve ecological problems, regulate environmental pollution, and drive enterprises to carry out green innovations. This paper constructs a theoretical framework of environmental protection subsidies, environmental tax collection, and enterprise green innovation by taking the China A-share manufacturing listed enterprises as a research sample. Further, we explore the contingency impact of the market-expected performance gap and market competition on the enterprise green innovation. The empirical results show that there is a linear positive driving relationship between environmental protection subsidies and enterprise green innovation. The relationship between environmental tax collection and enterprise green innovation is a U-shaped relationship that first inhibits and then promotes. The market expectation performance gap moderates between environmental subsidy and enterprise green innovation. Market competition plays a reinforcing role in environmental subsidy, environmental tax collection, and enterprise green innovation. These research findings are conducive to providing theoretical support and reference for the government to encourage enterprises to actively carry out green innovation in practice, thereby helping to promote green development in the country.