This paper reviews the size and growth of government spending. Section I surveys the empirical evidence on the growth of government expenditures. First, a number of measurement issues are raised, including the definition of the public sector, the appearance of off-budget expenditures, and the...

The author explores the effects of privatization, competition, and regulation on telecommunications performance in 30 African and Latin American countries from 1984 to 1997. Competition is associated with tangible benefits in terms of mainline penetration, number of pay phones, connection...

Many observers attributed the rapid productivity growth observed in the United States in the mid- to late 1990s, to the growing use of information, and the Internet. This in turn created concern that developing, and transition economies - where use of information technology, and the Internet was...

Policymakers are simultaneously concerned about the consequences of a worsening"digital divide"between rich and poor countries and hopeful that information and computing technologies could increase economic growth in developing countries. But very little research has explored the reasons for the...

The authors examine the liberalization of the basic telecommunications sector in Asian countries with a view to identifying good policy and determining how multilateral negotiations can promote it. They find that most Asian governments, despite the move away from traditional public monopolies,...

Every country serious about introducing competition finds that the transition from monopoly to competition is both economically rewarding and laden with policy dilemmas. As a new century begins, we have an essentially new market for telecommunications. Digital technology forced a re-examination...

Network activities typically involve collecting a good or service (such as electric utilities, phone services, and rail transportation) from many producers or distributing them to many users. Producers and users are often widely scattered, geographically. Close financial integration of networks...

There is considerable debate in economics literature on whether a decision by developing countries to strengthen their protection of intellectual property rights (IPRs) will increase or reduce their access to modern technologies invented by industrial countries. This access can be achieved...

The paper documents the case of Uganda's telecommunications reform. Uganda is one of only two countries in Africa that decided to privatize telecommunications in a competitive framework by selling a second national operator license. The authors find that Uganda did not sacrifice significant...

In response to the recent wave ofprivatizing and regulating monopolies in developing countries, the authors evaluate the impact of different regulatory schemes on private sector behavior in the telecommunications sector in seven countries. They find that regulation is most effective - meaning,...