Background:

Pollution related to transport in big cities in Latin America and its impact on human health, and time loss due to congestion amongst other externalities are a growing concern. There are many analyses exploring this relationship at the macro and meso-levels. However, there are very few studies examining this relationship at the micro-economic level, less so in cities of developing countries

Methodology:

We run a linear, quadratic and cubic ordinary least squares regression between income and three pollutants: carbon monoxide (CO), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and carbon dioxide (CO2eq) for a representative sample of 10 582 households within Mexico City Metropolitan Area (ZMVM) from 2010, 2012 and 2014.

Results:

The paper shows a monotonic relation (positively linear) for CO and CO2eq and quadratic (inverted U-shape) for NOx, the least abundant of the three pollutants.

Conclusions:

Evidence shows that even at levels of income above the turning point observed in the literature, richer households still do not choose to internalize the social cost of polluting, therefore it is urgent to design public policies aimed at a switch in ways of transport.