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1.
Beniamina Buzzo Margari Fabrizio Erbetta Carmelo Petraglia Massimiliano Piacenza 《Journal of Regulatory Economics》2007,32(2):131-151
This paper assesses the impact of regulatory and environmental factors and statistical noise on the efficiency of public transit
systems within a DEA-based framework. Using a panel of Italian companies, we implement a DEA-SFA mixed approach based on [H.O.
Fried et al. (2002) Journal of Productivity Analysis, 17(1–2), 157–174] to decompose DEA inefficiency measures into three components: exogenous effects, managerial inefficiency and
stochastic events. Besides providing evidence on the determinants of input-specific efficiency differentials across companies,
the results point out that managerial skills play a minor role, and emphasize the relevance of regulatory policies aimed at
replacing cost-plus subsidization with high-powered incentive contracts as well as improving environmental conditions of public
transit networks.
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2.
Guerino Ardizzi Carmelo Petraglia Massimiliano Piacenza Gilberto Turati 《Review of Income and Wealth》2014,60(4):747-772
We contribute to the debate on how to assess the size of the underground (or shadow) economy by proposing a reinterpretation of the traditional Currency Demand Approach (CDA) à la Tanzi. In particular, we introduce three main innovations. First, we take a direct measure of the value of cash transactions—the flow of cash withdrawn from bank accounts relative to total non‐cash payments—as the dependent variable in the money demand equation. This allows us to avoid unrealistic assumptions on the velocity of money and the absence of any irregular transaction in a given year, overcoming two severe critiques to the traditional CDA. Second, in place of the tax burden level, usually intended as the main motivation for non‐compliance, we include among the covariates two direct indicators of detected tax evasion. Finally, we control also for the role of illegal production considering crimes like drug dealing and prostitution, which—jointly with the shadow economy—contributes to the larger aggregate of the non‐observed economy and represents a significant component of total cash payments. We propose then an application of this “modified CDA” to a panel of 91 Italian provinces for the years 2005–08. 相似文献
3.
Giovanni Fraquelli Massimiliano Piacenza Graziano Abrate 《Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics》2004,75(2):193-225
Abstract Empirical studies on the cost structure of Public Transit Networks are mainly based on specialized firms providing urban or intercity services. In this study we estimate a translogarithmic variable cost function to assess the behaviour of returns to scale and the impact of network characteristics. The analysis is based on a sample of 45 Italian municipal companies observed from 1996 to 1998 and including both specialized and mixed transit operators. Results confirm previous evidence on the existence of natural monopoly in the industry and support a regulation introducing competitive tenders to access to the market. In addition, we provide insights about the advantages associated with urban‐intercity diversification and with the improvement of network commercial speed. Cost benefits can then be achieved by promoting mergers between neighbouring firms, so as to create new companies operating on integrated local networks and supplying in combination urban and intercity public transport. Implications of such a strategy for the design of tender mechanisms are also underlined, together with the need for a regulatory policy which takes more care of speed‐up measures. 相似文献
4.
Within the recent debate on liberalization of local public services, the paper investigates the cost properties of a sample of Italian public utilities providing in combination gas, water and electricity. The estimates from a Composite Cost Function econometric model (Pulley and Braunstein, 1992) are compared with the ones coming from other traditional functional forms such as the Standard Translog, the Generalized Translog, and the Separable Quadratic. The results highlight the presence of global scope and scale economies only for multi-utilities with output levels lower than the ones characterizing the ‘median’ firm. This indicates that relatively small specialized firms would benefit from cost reductions by evolving into multi-utilities providing similar network services such as gas, water and electricity. However, for larger-scale utilities the hypothesis of null cost advantages is not rejected. Thus, it is possible that the recent diversification waves of leading companies are explained by factors other than cost synergies, so that the welfare gains that can be reasonably expected from such examples of horizontal integration, if any, are likely to be very low. 相似文献
5.
Massimiliano Piacenza 《Journal of Productivity Analysis》2006,25(3):257-277
The main objective of this paper is to investigate the way subsidization mechanisms affect the cost efficiency of public transit
systems, taking into account the role played by the environmental characteristics of each network. A cost frontier model is
estimated for a seven-year panel of 44 Italian transit companies run under two different regulatory schemes (cost-plus or
fixed-price), using the approach proposed by Kumbhakar et al. (1991), Huang and Liu (1994) and Battese and Coelli (1995).
The main evidence is that, given network characteristics, transit operators with high-powered incentive contracts (fixed-price
subsidies) exhibit lower distortions from the minimum costs. Environmental conditions (network speed levels) also have a significant
impact on inefficiency differentials and influence the efficacy of incentive regulation. Overall, these results highlight
a scope for transport policy to increase X-efficiency. Furthermore, they stress the importance of incentive theory and modern
regulatory economics for the production analysis of regulated utilities. 相似文献
6.
Funding and School Accountability: The Importance of Private and Decentralised Public Funding for Pupil Attainment 下载免费PDF全文
We discuss the issue of how schools should be financed, concentrating on the role of private funding and public funding via subnational governments as accountability mechanisms in the provision of educational services. The historical evolution of school regulation in Italy and Spain has created differences in the percentage of pupils who attend private schools, the percentage of private school funding coming from public and private sources and the percentage of public school funding that comes from central or local government sources. We take advantage of these institutional diversities rooted in history to estimate the disciplining role of these different sources of funding in the context of an educational production function using Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) data. Our results provide support to both accountability mechanisms and point to the presence of an important interplay between them. 相似文献
7.
Umberto Galmarini Simone Pellegrino Massimiliano Piacenza Gilberto Turati 《International Tax and Public Finance》2014,21(3):468-497
In order to analyze the determinants of tax evasion, the existing literature on individual tax compliance typically takes a ‘prior-to-audit’ point of view. This paper focuses on a ‘post-audit, post-detection’—so far unexplored—framework, by investigating what happens after tax evasion has been discovered and noncompliant taxpayers are asked to pay their debts. We first develop a two-period dynamic model of individual choice, considering an individual that has been already audited and detected as tax evader, who knows that Tax Authorities are looking for her to cash the due amount. We derive the optimal decision of running away in order to avoid paying the bill, and show that the experience of a prior tax notice reduces the probability to behave as a scofflaw. We then exploit information on ‘post-audit, post-detection’ tax compliance provided by an Italian collection agency for the period 2004–2007 to empirically assess the relationship between prior tax notices and unlawful behavior. The evidence from alternative logit model specifications supports our theoretical prediction: successful tax notices are negatively correlated with the probability of running away. 相似文献
8.
Carlo Cambini Massimiliano Piacenza Davide Vannoni 《Review of Industrial Organization》2007,31(3):183-203
This paper analyses the cost structure of a sample of local public transport companies operating in medium and large urban
centres in Italy in order to identify the proper network configuration for the service. Technological characteristics of public
transit systems are analysed by estimating both variable and total cost function models. The evidence shows the presence of short-run and long-run economies of scale, as well as of economies
of network density. This suggests that a suitable network design should at least include a large urban centre, while a regulatory
policy aimed at fragmenting the served area would imply an efficiency loss.
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9.
byMassimiliano Piacenza Davide Vannoni 《Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics》2009,80(3):431-450
ABSTRACT ** : The empirical literature on the cost structure of the electric utility industry traditionally focused on the measurement of specific technological properties: 1) scale economies in generation or distribution; 2) multi-product (or horizontal) scope economies at one particular stage; 3) multi-stage (or vertical) scope economies. By adopting an integrated approach, which simultaneously considers both horizontal and vertical aspects of the technology, we find the presence, on a sample of Italian electric utilities, of both vertical integration gains and horizontal scope economies at the downstream stage. In the light of recent regulatory reforms aiming at restructuring European electricity markets, our findings have important policy implications as for the proper configuration of the industry. Moreover, this methodology can be usefully applied to the study of the production structure of other public network utilities involved in similar vertical and horizontal reorganization processes. 相似文献
10.
Cost Savings From Generation and Distribution with an Application to Italian Electric Utilities* 总被引:1,自引:1,他引:1
Giovanni?FraquelliEmail author Massimiliano?Piacenza Davide?Vannoni 《Journal of Regulatory Economics》2005,28(3):289-308
In the last decade, the European Commission promoted a new regulatory framework aiming at a gradual liberalization of the
energy markets. The introduction of competition among generators implies the need to separate generation from transmission
and distribution activities. However, if savings can be reached by operating at different stages, vertical separation would
increase the costs of providing power. This paper tests for the presence of economies from vertical integration on a sample
of Italian local electric utilities and finds evidence of both multi-stage economies of scale and vertical economies. Even
if the hypothesis of global subadditivity is not supported, our evidence suggests that a complete divestiture policy would
entail efficiency losses.
*For helpful comments and discussions, we thank two anonymous referees, Graziano Abrate, Bruno Bosco, Diego Piacentino, and
participants at the 31st Annual Conference of the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics (EARIE), Berlin,
Germany, 2–5 September, 2004, the 60th Congress of the International Institute of Public Finance (IIPF), Milan, Italy, 23–26 August, 2004, and seminars held at the Bocconi University, University of Lecce, University of
Naples, University of Pavia, and University of Turin, where earlier versions of this paper were presented. The financial support
of MIUR (COFIN 2002) and HERMES Research Center is gratefully acknowledged. The usual disclaimer applies.
**HERMES, Center for Research on Regulated Services, Fondazione Collegio Carlo Alberto, Via Real Collegio 30, 10024 Moncalieri
(TO), Italy, http://www.hermesricerche.it. 相似文献