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on Regulation |
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Issue of 2005‒09‒11
twelve papers chosen by Christian Calmes Université du Québec en Outaouais, Canada |
| By: | Ambec, Stefan; Barla, Philippe |
| Abstract: | Cet article présente de manière non technique certains des fondements théoriques possibles de l'hypothèse de Porter selon laquelle, des réglementations environmentales strictes peuvent améliorer le profit des industries qui y sont soumises. Après une brève présentation de l'hypothèse, les arguments basés sur l'existence d'imperfections au sein de l'entreprise sont passés en revue. Les imperfections du marché susceptibles d'éventuellement justifier l'hypothèse de Porter sont ensuite discutées. Les principales conclusions de ce survol sont: i) l'hypothèse de Porter requiert l'interacton de l'externalité environmentale avec au moins une autre souce de distorsions, ii) le type d'intervention publique qui peut aboutir à un effet à la Porter dépend de la nature des distorsions qui interagissent. L'atteinte de l'optimum peut exiger l'usage de plusieurs instruments, iii) l'exploration empirique de l'hypothèse de Porter doit, pour être valide, autoriser la présence de ces multiples distorsions. |
| Keywords: | Réglementation environmentale, hypothèse de Porter, compétitivité |
| JEL: | Q50 Q52 Q55 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lvl:laeccr:0504&r=reg |
| By: | Tooraj Jamasb; Michael Pollitt |
| Abstract: | Electricity reform has coincided with a significant decline in energy R&D activities. Technical progress is crucial for tackling many energy and environmental issues as well as for long-term efficiency improvement. This paper reviews the industrial organisation literature on innovation to explore the causes of this decline, and shows that it was predicted by the pre-reform literature. More recent evidence endorses this conclusion. At the same time, R&D productivity and innovative output appear to have improved in both electric utilities and equipment suppliers, in line with general improvements in the operating efficiency of the sector. Despite this, a lasting decline in basic R&D and innovation input into basic research may negatively affect development of radical technological innovation in the long run. There is a need for reorientation of energy technology policies and spending toward more basic research, engaging more firms in R&D, encouraging collaborative research, and exploring public private partnerships. |
| Keywords: | innovation, R&D expenditure, electricity reform, regulation, ownership |
| JEL: | L94 O38 |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cam:camdae:0533&r=reg |
| By: | Hibbs Jr., Douglas A. (CEFOS, Göteborg University); Piculescu, Violeta (Department of Economics, School of Economics and Commercial Law, Göteborg University) |
| Abstract: | In this paper we propose a model of how institutional benefits, taxation and government regulations affect the productive activity of private enterprises. We consider an environment in which public officials enforcing tax and regulatory obligations are potentially corruptible, and markets for corruption may therefore arise that give firms the option of producing unofficially and evading taxes and regulations. By contrast to some previous studies that view corruption and bribery as forces driving firms out of official production into the underground economy, our model features the idea that the ‘grabbing hands’ of corrupt bureaucrats may alternatively serve as ‘helping hands’ allowing firms to exploit profitable opportunities in the unofficial sector. And contrary to a traditional view maintaining that high tax rates are intrinsically a major cause of large shadow economies, our model implies that incentives to evade taxation and produce underground depend on statutory tax rates relative to firm-specific thresholds of tax toleration. Tax toleration is determined, among other things, by firm-specific institutional benefits available to official producers and the costs of corruption required to produce unofficially. Some core predictions of the model concerning the determinants of tax toleration and the relative size of unofficial activity and tax evasion receive broad support from empirical analyses based on firm-level data from the World Business Environment Surveys sponsored by the World Bank. <p> |
| Keywords: | institutions; corruption; tax evasion; tax toleration; unofficial economy; underground economy; black economy; WEBS |
| JEL: | D21 H26 K42 O17 |
| Date: | 2005–08–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0173&r=reg |
| By: | Eggert, Håkan (Department of Economics, School of Economics and Commercial Law, Göteborg University); Lokina, Razack B (National Environment Management Council (NEMC)) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the causes for regulatory compliance using traditional deterrence variables and potential moral and social variables. We use self-reported data from Tanzanian artisanal fishers in Lake Victoria. The results indicate that fishers adjust their violation rates with respect to changes in the probability of detection and punishment, but they also react to legitimacy and social variables. A small group of persistent violators react neither to normative aspects nor to traditional deterrence variables, but systematically violate the regulation and use bribes to avoid punishment. <p> |
| Keywords: | compliance; fishery; Lake Victoria; legitimacy; normative; deterrence |
| JEL: | K42 L51 Q22 |
| Date: | 2005–08–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0175&r=reg |
| By: | Eduardo Saavedra (ILADES-Georgetown University, Universidad Alberto Hurtado) |
| Abstract: | Este trabajo este trabajo discute la evolución de ciertos indicadores representativos del desempeño de cada una de los servicios básicos en Chile utilizando los elementos previamente descritos. Se concluye que el desempeño de estas industrias en los últimos 15 años ha generado mayor bienestar para la sociedad que de haberse mantenido la tendencia regulatoria mostrada durante el régimen militar. No obstante esa conclusión, este trabajo argumenta que existe espacio para realizar una serie de políticas modernizadoras a la actual institucionalidad reguladora de servicios básicos, entregándose algunas directrices que propicias para generar una discusión en este tenor. |
| Keywords: | Sector Eléctrico, Telecomunicaciones, Sanitarias, Regulación, Modernización |
| JEL: | K23 L51 L97 |
| Date: | 2005–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ila:ilades:inv167&r=reg |
| By: | Werner Eichhorst (IZA Bonn); Regina Konle-Seidl (Institute for Employment Research (IAB)) |
| Abstract: | Employment protection legislation, unemployment benefits and active labor market policy are Janus-faced institutions. On the one hand they are devices of insurance against labor market risk that provide income and employment security. On the other hand they influence the capacities of labor markets to adapt to changing economic conditions since institutional features of the welfare state also affect actors’ economic adaptation strategies. Insufficient labor market adaptability results in higher and more persistent unemployment. Hence, in order to in-crease the adaptability of European labor markets, reforms had to address these closely inter-acting policy areas. The first aim of the paper is to describe recent reforms of employment protection, unemployment insurance and active labor market policies in different European welfare states (Denmark, Sweden, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Spain and Germany). The paper shows whether and to what extent national policy patterns converge in the direction of a new balance of flexibility and security with employment protection being eased and labor market policies being "activated" through a combination of "carrots and sticks". Secondly, in terms of the political economy of welfare state reforms, the paper will answer the question whether consistent reforms of the three institutions are more likely in political systems characterized by relative strong government and/or social partnership since such institutional prerequisites may favor "package deals" across policy areas. |
| Keywords: | employment protection, labor market policy, unemployment insurance, labor market reform |
| JEL: | J58 J68 J65 |
| Date: | 2005–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp1718&r=reg |
| By: | Tue Gørgens (Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen); Martin Paldam (Department of Economics, University of Aarhus); Allan H. Würtz (Department of Economics, University of Copenhagen) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the effect on GDP growth of income (GDP per capita) and economic regulation. A simple theoretical framework presents two opposing views. We analyze the empirical relation using a non-linear dynamic panel data model with fixed effects. The result shows that the effect of regulation on growth depends on income. For low-income countries, there is little effect of changing regulation. For highly regulated middle-income countries, deregulation can increase growth. For high-income countries, deregulation leads to higher growth. Holding regulation constant, there is catch-up growth with a maximum at an intermediate income level. |
| Keywords: | catch-up growth; economic freedom; fixed effects; GMM; specification tests |
| JEL: | C23 D70 H11 O40 |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kud:kuieca:2005_12&r=reg |
| By: | Michelle J. White |
| Abstract: | This paper surveys research on the economics of corporate and personal bankruptcy law. Since the literatures on the two types of bankruptcy have developed in isolation of each other, a goal of the survey is to draw out parallels between them. Both theoretical and empirical research are discussed. |
| JEL: | K2 G3 |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11536&r=reg |
| By: | Simi Kedia; Thomas Philippon |
| Abstract: | We argue that earnings management and fraudulent accounting have important economic consequences. In a model where the costs of earnings management are endogenous, we show that in equilibrium, bad managers hire and invest too much in order to pool with the good managers. This behavior distorts the allocation of economic resources among firms. We test the predictions of the model using new historical and firm-level data. First, we show that periods of high stock market valuations are systematically followed by large increases in reported frauds. We then show that during periods of suspicious accounting, firms hire and invest excessively, while insiders exercise options and sell stocks. When the misreporting is detected, firms shed labor and capital and productivity improves. In the aggregate, our model seems able to account for periods of jobless and investment-less growth. |
| JEL: | E0 G3 |
| Date: | 2005–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11573&r=reg |
| By: | Nobuo Akai (School of Business Administration at the University of Hyogo); Yusaku Horiuchi () (Asia Pacific School of Economics and Government, Australian National University); Masayo Sakata (Faculty of Politics, Economics and Law at the Osaka International University) |
| Abstract: | Theoretical studies suggest that corruption may counteract government failure and promote economic growth in the short run, given exogenously determined suboptimal bureaucratic rules and regulations. As the government failure is itself a function of corruption, however, corruption should have detrimental effects on economic growth in the long run. In this paper, we measure the rate of economic growth for various time spans—short (1998–2000), middle (1995–2000) and long (1991–2000)—using previously uninvestigated state-level cross-section data for the United States. Our two-stage least square (2SLS) estimates with a carefully selected set of instruments show that the effect of corruption on economic growth is indeed negative and statistically significant in the middle and long spans but insignificant in the short span. |
| Keywords: | corruption, economic growth, United States, US |
| JEL: | D73 F43 C21 |
| Date: | 2005–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eab:govern:555&r=reg |
| By: | Sugata Marjit (Department of Economics and Finance, City University of Hong Kong); Amit Biswas (Viswasharati University, india) |
| Abstract: | Stringent regulations coupled with corruption generate and sustain extra legal or informal transactions in the developing countries. Does trade related reform discourage informal activities and corruption? This appears attempts to analyze such a phenomenon. An import competing firm allocates production between a high wage formal and a low wage informal segment. Illegal use of labour in the informal sectior is characterized by a probability of punishment which depends on the size of the informal output. In such a structure, as tariff comes down, total employment contracts but the informal sector expands. However, lowering of interest rate, possibly through the liberalization of capital account, tends to reduce the size of the informal segment. Hence, trade reforms may have conflicting impact on informaility and corruption. |
| Keywords: | Trade liberalization, informal sector, corruption |
| JEL: | F11 H2 |
| Date: | 2004–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eab:tradew:607&r=reg |
| By: | Sugata Marjit (Department of Economics and Finance, City University of Hong Kong); Amit Biswas (Viswasharati University, india); Hamid Beladi (North Dakota University) |
| Abstract: | Lucas (1976) had argued that interventionist policies macroeconomics may fail because policies themselves affect the optimal behaviour of private agents and hence the associated response parameters. We extend Lucas' arguement and propose that huighly controlled and regulated environment leads to misinterpretation of official statistics and therefore distort policy predictions based on such information. In a way policies will have predicitability in a more open and less regulated environment. |
| Keywords: | Lucas critique, policy distortion, regulation |
| JEL: | E10 K23 K42 |
| Date: | 2005–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eab:tradew:609&r=reg |