This paper offers a comprehensive evaluation of the welfare impact of a policy usually regarded as highly successful and vastly imitated worldwide: the privatisation policy pursued in the UK by MrsThatcher's government (1979-1990) and subsequently by Mr Major's government (1990-1997) The British...

We study the impact on consumers of privatization and liberalization in the telecommunication sector for 15 EU Countries. Policy reforms are summarized by the OECD regulatory indicators (REGREF), that considers the extent of privatization, vertical disintegration, and market entry. After...

This paper proposes three propositions for the future of European industrial policy, based on a discussion of the Report 'An Agenda for a Growing Europe' (Sapir at al, 2004). My first proposition is that the growth gap between Us and Eu indeed exists, it is not a statistical artefact, in spite...

In this paper we examine the emergence over the last two decades in the EU of a dominant policy paradigm on the reform of network industries. We consider the broad recommendations by the OECD and the European Commission, and the Directives adopted by the European Union on the reform of some...

The paper discusses possible interpretations of the fall of the public enterprise in the economic ideology of the European left-wing parties. The first section rejects the claim that a technological shift has weakened the case for the nationalization of natural monopolies. Economies of scale in...

La legge 17 Maggio n. 144 del 1999 richiedeva a tutte le amministrazioni centrali e regionali in Italia di dotarsi di un nucleo di valutazione degli investimenti pubblici a supporto dell'attività di programmazione "con la finalità di migliorare e... dare maggiore qualità ed efficienza al...

Wagner's Law would imply an exponential growth process of the ratio between public expenditures and national income (G/Y). However the law may be rejected both on theoretical and empirical reasons, because it disregards the role of ever increasing distortionary taxation. But, under...

The research question addressed by this paper is a simple one: are European consumers happy with the services provided by the utilities after two decades of reforms? We focus on electricity, gas, water, telephone in the EU 15 Member States. The variables we analyse are consumers’ satisfaction...