Government Low‐Carbon Regulations Based on Supply Chain Members’ Behavior and Consumers’ Channel Preference in a Dual‐Channel Supply Chain

As carbon emissions are increasing due to the development of economy, low‐carbon supply chain plays an important role in carbon emissions reduction and the dual‐channel supply chain has become a hit because online shopping is developing rapidly. Therefore, this paper builds a Stackelberg game model led by the manufacturer in a dual‐channel supply chain to examine the reaction of the government under centralized or decentralized decisions‐making structures with different low‐carbon strategies. The result shows that the government can achieve higher profits by taking incentive or punitive measures for centralized decision‐making supply chain no matter they invest in emissions reduction or not. Moreover, for decentralized decision‐making mode, increasing low‐carbon subsidies for retailers can achieve a win‐win result between the supply chain and the government; and, finally, channel competition is good for improving the supply chain and social benefits. Therefore, the government is responsible for taking reasonable subsidy policies, formulate industry’s low‐carbon standards, and properly guide competition between supply chain members to achieve higher profits.