Do Finance and Digitalization Foster Environmental Sustainability? Evidence from U.S. Carbon Emissions

This study reexamines the drivers of carbon emissions in the United States by integrating energy efficiency, financial accessibility, and information and communication technology (ICT) within a unified empirical framework. Using annual data from 1990 to 2022, the analysis employs the autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to capture both short-run dynamics and long-run equilibrium relationships. The findings reveal that economic growth and urbanization exert upward pressure on carbon emissions, reflecting the continued reliance on energy-intensive production structures and urban expansion. In contrast, energy efficiency improvements, enhanced financial accessibility, and increased ICT adoption significantly mitigate environmental degradation by promoting cleaner technologies, improving resource allocation, and facilitatingsustainable consumption patterns. The error correction mechanism confirms a stable long-run relationship among the variables, while causality…