Economic, Social, Medical, Work Injury, and Environmental Efficiency Assessments

Abstract

Improving the management efficiency of industrial accidents is significant for stabilizing social order and improving production efficiency. Although many previous studies have discussed the impact of work injury on different occupations from the work safety and health perspectives, few have jointly discussed economic, social, medical, and environmental pollution issues, and those that do mostly employ static models, failing to take into account welfare factors and environmental pollution issues that affect society. Therefore, in order to understand the dynamic evolution trend between social and economic activities and environmental issues, this study utilizes a modified undesirable two-stage dynamic exogenous data envelopment analysis (DEA) model to explore the economic, social, medical, and environmental efficiencies of 30 provinces in China to fill the gap in the literature. In terms of work injury insurance expenditure efficiency, the results show that the air quality index (AQI) impacts the ranking of China’s 30 provincial regions, with Fujian, Ningxia, Qinghai, Shandong, Tianjin, and Xinjiang being greatly affected. AQI significantly influences overall factor efficiency, rescue invalid deaths, and the work-related injuries in the various regions. AQI also has a relatively small effect on the efficiency of work injury insurance benefits. Based on this, we offer suggestions for policy makers to evaluate the social benefits of environmental governance and the efficiency of human capital.