While models of mixed oligopoly have been analyzed within a rapidly growing literature, little is known about the mechanism of efficiency improvement relating to partial privatization. In this paper, we endogenize efficiency improvement in relation to the level of privatization. We show that in...

This paper studies a liberalized postal market where entrants may offer end-to-end products or concentrate on one of the segments of the network. Absent effective bypass, entry does not appear to be a serious financial threat to the incumbent, even when the products are perfect substitutes. This...

The paper investigates the effect of public ownership on regulatory commitment. The empirical setting is provided by the Italian natural gas liberalization reform, that made competitive bidding compulsory to award gas distribution franchises at municipality level. On average, a municipality...

The economic rates of return for utility privatization projects in Argentina are very high, whether or not distributional weights are considered. But there is a very high shadow price for regulatory activity, which tends to be ignored in most privatization exercises. And how serious a government...

Contractual flexibility in public-private partnerships increases plausible political contestability and industry capture. The anticipation of political hazards, hold-up, and knowledge-transfer barriers redounds to regulatory and contractual rigidities that reduce managerial efficiency and often...

The modernization of the solid waste management sector prompted by the Ronchi decree of 1997 has proceeded slowly and is far from being completed. Regional differentials in the effectiveness of local policies and in the efficiency of waste collection and disposal firms are still large. Southern...

Starting from an industry where production is provided by a public monopolist, we look at the effects on the consumers' surplus of a sequence of reforms in network industry. Using a simple comparative statics framework, we find indifference conditions in consumers' surplus between respectively...

Spanish Abstract: El documento presenta una revisión de la literatura sobre empresas públicas y regulación, con el objetivo de establecer las características fundamentales que debería contener esta última para atender a las particularidades de dichas empresas. Identificar las diferencias...

The fundamental feature of private contracting is its relational nature. When faced with unforeseen or unexpected circumstances, private parties, as long as the relation remains worthwhile, adjust their required performance without the need for costly renegotiation or formal recontracting....