Using input-output and world price data, this study computes domestic resource costs (DRCs) for branches of manufacturing industry in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland and the former Soviet Union. The results show a wide dispersion of DRCs in each country, including branches with...

Eastern Europe is not well served with straightforward textbook advice. The common wisdom on privatization fails to address the problems created by diffuse ownership and control prior to privatization. Cash auctions may not efficiently match managers and capital stock because of wealth...

Governments throughout Eastern Europe have been singularly unsuccessful in dealing with large loss-making SOEs. A more promising approach would create an incentive framework and legal environment where the SOE's major non-government creditor can take the lead in initiating restructuring and the...

Several East European countries are embarking on major programmes both to expand their private sectors by encouraging new firm formation, and to transfer much of the existing state sector into private ownership. This paper studies the early experience of Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia in...