Evidence of public expenditure on infrastructure is extremely sparse. Little is known about the trends and patterns of infrastructure expenditure, and there is no real basis for assessing the adequacy and efficiency of infrastructure spending. Drawing on the World Bank's novel BOOST database,...

This paper analyzes power utilities in 15 jurisdictions to understand the determinants of success for reforms aimed at improving financial viability and cost recovery in the power sector and the impacts of these reforms on metrics of sector performance. The analysis finds that electricity...

Subsidies to residential utility customers are popular among policymakers, utility managers, and utility customers alike, but they are nonetheless the subject of much controversy. Utility subsidies are seen as a way to help make utility service affordable for poor households and as an...

Some 25 years have elapsed since international financial institutions espoused a package of power sector reform measures that became known as the Washington Consensus. This package encompassed the establishment of autonomous regulatory entities, the vertical and horizontal unbundling of...

Subsidies to residential utility customers are popular among policymakers, utility managers, and utility customers alike, but they are nonetheless the subject of much controversy. Utility subsidies are seen as a way to help make utility service affordable for poor households and as an...

Market-oriented reforms of infrastructure in developing countries tend to focus primarily on commercially viable services in urban areas. Nevertheless, an increasing number of countries are beginning to experiment with extending the market paradigm to infrastructure services in rural areas that...