A methodology to measure administrative burdens, based on the Dutch Standard Cost Model (SCM), has been applied in a large number of European countries, coupled in most cases with the commitment to a reduction target. This paper compares the application of the method in different national...

This paper shows that if moral hazard leads to credit rationing, an appropriate usury law must raise social welfare. Under market clearing, a usury law is always beneficial if funds are inelastically supplied. When entrepreneurial heterogeneity is introduced, an improvement arises even when the...

Credit market imperfections can prevent the poor from making profitable investments. Under asymmetric information observable features, such as wealth and collateral, play an important role in determining who gets credit, in violation of the Equality of Opportunity principle. We define equality...

This paper demonstrates, in a dynamic model of monopoly regulation with price-cap, that a periodic price review may increase productive efficiency. When the firm's choice of cost-reducing effort depends on the volume of output supplied, a periodic revision allows the regulator to set more...

This paper surveys existing explanations for the pervasive use of collateral in credit markets and relates them to the empirical evidence on the subject. Collateral may be used as a screening or an incentive device in markets characterized by various forms of asymmetric and biased information....

This paper examines the possibility that regulation actually increases a monopolist’s cost-efficiency. When the firm’s cost-reducing effort depends on the output supplied, a binding price-cap, by compelling the monopolist to produce more, finally results in lower costs. On the...

In the face of past ambiguous results on growth effects of education when measured through school attainment, some papers suggest that some countries may be unable to use productively their schooling output because of the scope of cronyism. We dig deeper and demonstrate that, in a stylized...