Responsible production has become increasingly vital in the global sustainability discourse, particularly in manufacturing. The extended producer responsibility (EPR) system is a critical policy mechanism that encourages manufacturers to reduce their environmental impact. Despite its growing significance, comprehensive studies assessing its effectiveness are sparse. Our research aims to address this gap by evaluating the influence of the EPR system on responsible production practices in European manufacturing enterprises. We employed the difference-in-differences (DiD) method to assess the impact, analysing panel data from 27 manufacturing enterprises across the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Estonia, Hungary, and Bulgaria, from 2010 to 2022. This method was chosen to mitigate endogeneity concerns. The results from the DiD analysis reveal a statistically significant positive impact of the EPR system on the circular material use rate, with an average increase of 10,5%. These findings indicate that the EPR system effectively enhances circular material use within the electronics manufacturing industry, a critical sector for advancing environmental sustainability.

This study examines the complex relationships between economic growth and income inequality in different regions of Kazakhstan, revealing the nuances of their interaction. The article aims to assess the long-term and short-term effects of economic growth on income inequality in both forward and reverse directions across the regions of Kazakhstan. Employing region-specific time series data allowed us to examine the bidirectional impact of economic growth on inequality, using an error correction model (ECM) to describe short-run and long-run relationships. The results highlight that the relationship between economic growth and income inequality is heterogeneous across regions, reflecting each area's unique economic and social landscapes. The estimation results support the hypothesis of an inverted U-shaped Kuznets curve linking GRP per capita to inequality with varying starting points for different regions. Regarding the inverse relationship, we identified a positive causal relationship for the West Kazakhstan, Zhambyl and Pavlodar regions, indicating that increased income inequality stimulated economic growth. The study also highlights the significant role of trade, labour force, investment and government consumption in shaping these relationships.