Economics of scale and scope in multiproduct firms: evidence from US railroads

Recently, there has been a surge of interest in analysing scale economies in US railroad firms. The analysis of scale economies in existing studies is, however, limited in view of recent advances in the theory of the multiproduct firm. In this paper, the previous work is extended to address the issue of scale and scope economies in multiproduct firms. The findings show that US railroads experience mild overall economies of scale, but rather marked product-specific economies of scale with respect to both freight and passenger services. However, there appear to be diseconomies of scope associated with the joint production of the two services. Based on these results, this study indicates that US railroad firms would have no tendency to behave as a natural monopoly in the absence of regulation.     

Railroad deregulation,carrier behavior,and shipper response: A disaggregated analysis

The Staggers Rail Act of 1980 provided American railroads with almost complete relief from rate regulation. Regulatory reforms resulted in rapid and pronounced changes in firm behavior and an eventual reconfiguration of the industry as a whole. This investigation provides a highly disaggregated study of deregulated rail rates for seventeen commodities. The results indicate that the Staggers Act fundamentally altered the way in which rail carriers price their services. As importantly, the results suggest that shippers have responded to altered railroad behavior by changing the characteristics of their shipments. Together, the changes in railroad behavior and shipper responses to these variations have produced lower railroad rates for a small but measurable number of movements across a wide range of commodities.     

Consumer surplus and the reform of network industries: a primer

Starting from an industry where production is provided by a public monopolist, we observe the effects of a sequence of reforms within the network industry on consumer surplus. Using a simple comparative statics framework, we find the indifference conditions for the consumer surplus under the following regimes: a public monopoly, an unregulated private monopoly, a regulated private monopoly, a vertically disintegrated monopoly, a duopoly and a liberalized market. The results are determined by the relative size of the x-inefficiencies of the public monopolist, allocative inefficiencies of the private monopoly, the cost of unbundling and the costs related to establishing a competitive market.     

Labour inputs substitution during corporate restructuring: a translog model approach for US freight railroads

After deregulation in 1980, competitive pressures forced the large US freight railroads to reduce costs and restructure, resulting in an economic renaissance of the US railroad companies after years of poor financial conditions. The most striking restructuring measure receiving much attention was dramatic labour downsizing: until 2004 employment was reduced by 60%. But other overlooked measures are the significant restructuring of workforce composition, and important changes in railroads’ workplace organization practices and corporate culture. To better understand this successful occupational restructuring, I investigate labour inputs substitutional relationships by using a translog variable cost model. Labour is decomposed into six employee categories rather than traditional production–nonproduction breakdown to estimate inputs elasticities of substitution. The data investigated is a unique firm-level dataset on the US freight Class I Railroads, covering a 22-year period, which allows this fine-grained analysis. I also document railroad workplace organization practices relating to results and reflecting changes in railroads corporate culture. I find strong substitutability between managerial positions and transportation employees, pointing to achievement of better command and control of operations; a high degree of complementarity between the most skilled employee categories and the strongest substitute relationship between transportation and maintenance of Ways&Structures groups.     

Deregulation,Mergers, and Employment in the Railroad Industry

Since 1978, there have been dramatic changes in the railroad industry with partial deregulation, a massive consolidation of firms, a reduction in the size of the rail network, and a dramatic reduction in employment. In this paper, we focus on the effects of deregulation, a change in the traffic characteristics, miles of road, and consolidation, on employment by Class I railroads. We develop and estimate a model that allows these effects to be identified, finding that the largest employment declines emanate from the direct effect of partial deregulation, while smaller, but still large, employment declines emanate from mergers and changes in traffic mix.     

Unbundling the local loop

We study competition for high bandwidth services in the telecommunications industry by introducing the possibility of unbundling the local loop, where leased lines permit the entrant to provide services without building up its own infrastructure. We use a dynamic model of technology adoption and study the incentives of the entrant to lease loops and compete “service-based”, and/or to build up a new and more efficient infrastructure and compete “facility-based”, given the rental price.We show that the incumbent sets too low a rental price for its loops; hence, the entrant adopts the new technology too late from a social welfare perspective. The distortion may appear not only on the timing of technology adoption but also on the type (quality) of the new technology to be adopted. We also show that while regulating the rental price may suffice to achieve socially desirable outcomes, a sunset clause does not improve social welfare.     

Railroad Revisionists Revisited: Stock Market Evidence from the Progressive Era

From 1910–1917, the Interstate Commerce Commission repeatedly refused to grant requested railroad rate increases despite rising input costs. An event study shows that several Commission decisions resulted in statistically significant and economically meaningful negative excess returns for railroad stocks. The change in regulatory regime signaled by the 1917 Nationalization of the railroads generated large positive excess returns, which strengthens the assessment that the preceding regime was unfavorable to the railroads. These findings challenge the revisionist view of regulatory history, and suggest the need for closer study of regulatory implementation and evolution, and not simply regulatory origins.     

水(自然垄断)行业改造模式初探

Natural monopoly, because of its spontaneous or natural characteristics, must have some mysterious causes of reasonableness. Thus, the regulations to its efficiency loss would have a different way compared to other monopolies. That the characteristics of natural monopoly, in the case of water industry, are that the infrastructure investments are very large, most of which are used to build the transportation system? The webs for transporting their products to their customers, and the products are identity goods or services. By examining the characteristics of natural monopoly, this paper proposed a way to break up and remodel the industry of "natural monopoly". The main clue of remodeling is that the governments, who represent the public and who have the power to control over public resources, should build and maintain a public web platform for the goods' transportation uses, and break up the barrier of the entry so as to produce a market-oriented competitive structure. The running model and the condition of remodeling are put forward and the cost-revenue analysis of the operation is briefly under consideration.     

Revisiting electricity liberalization and quality of service: empirical evidence from New Zealand

What effect does the firm structure have on the quality of service delivered by networks and infrastructure industries? We answer this question by empirically assessing the impacts of complete vertical separation, such as ownership unbundling, on the quality of service delivered by a liberalized network industry. Electricity distribution utilities in New Zealand are considered for this purpose and are analysed using panel-data econometrics. The results show robust evidence that ownership unbundling contributed to a fall in the duration and frequency of supply interruptions in electricity distribution. However, the results also show that unbundling has no effect on reducing distribution network losses. These results, overall, highlight the nonsimple impacts of ownership unbundling on the quality of electricity distribution. We suggest that the quality of service may largely improve when considered in the economic regulation of electricity networks than completely relying on specific reform measures such as ownership unbundling.     

论港口业务领域的分类规制政策

港口产业是国民经济的战略性基础产业和自然垄断产业改革的重要对象。对港口产业经济特性的传统认识使之长期以政府规制和公共经营为主导发展特征,但这却导致港口服务低效率和高成本。以往研究港口产业经济特性时,一般是从整体的角度来描述其自然垄断性,并认为有必要由政府施加经济规制。但实际上,对港口业务应该做进一步细分,以更准确地认识其经济特性。根据对港口不同业务领域规制需求的分析,在港口产业规制改革的具体过程中应该实行分类规制政策。为保障港口民营化改革的成功实施,基于对港口各业务环节不同经济特性的分类识别,提出了港口规制改革政策的基本模式,即在仍具有自然垄断特征的基础设施环节保持内生规制和引进接入定价规制,在竞争性环节放松或取消规制、实行竞争强化战略,在中间领域引入激励性规制。     

天然气行业垄断行为的经济学分析

作为关系国计民生的天然气行业一直受政府的规制，实行国有垄断经营。应规避天然气行业的垄断弊端，对该行业进行天然气定价机制、打破行业垄断、建立合理管理体制，加强法制建设，以确保天然气行业健康、快速地发展。     

沿海内河船舶理赔公估实务的探讨

沿海内河船舶理赔公估是一项专业性和技术性要求都较高的工作,在实际工作中经常会遇到一些新的问题需要解答,尚需相关人士共同探讨。因而,试就如何搞好沿海内河船舶保险公估提出自己的观点。     

The Italian approach to the theory of public goods *

Abstract

The subject of needs is the centre of attention of Italian public finance scholars. The financial activity of the State is justified by the existence of collective or public needs to whose satisfaction collective or public goods and services are linked. Italian economists have studied the problems of public goods in a general context, taking into consideration concurrently both taxes and public expenditure and giving prominence to positive analysis. Italian theorists have always been far removed from the classical approach, which denies the productivity of public services, and have deemed it necessary to take into account the political context in which fiscal structures operate. Their models include the State as a major factor. Herein lies the main value of the Italian tradition in public finance, which puts in coercion into the market mechanism via State intervention.     

An economic estimate of the effect of a waterside location on property values

Since the rise of the railway, and the later development of road transport, the economic value of inland waterways in the UK as freight carriers has steadily declined. The reduction in the economic importance of canals has been somewhat offset by their growing popularity as a recreational resource, and by the amenity value which they provide to that part of the population living in close proximity to them. Focussing on two case study areas, this paper uses an hedonic price model to estimate the economic benefits which residents gain from a waterside location. These benefits may have important policy implications for those bodies who own undeveloped land bordering waterways.     

The Cost Structure of Australian Telecommunications

Since 1991 Australian telecommunications has undergone substantial reform. To a large extent, the economic correctness of pro-competitive policy depends on the non-existence of natural monopoly technology. This paper provides estimates of the Australian telecommunications system cost structure, and tests for subadditivity from 1943 to 1991. Additivity of the cost function after 1945 rejects the natural monopoly hypothesis and supports recent government policy. Diminished natural monopoly characteristics suggest that co-ordination between firms through networking can achieve similar economies as internal co-ordination within a monopoly. This finding is important, given the trend towards network unbundling, and service provision through interconnection.     

基础设施领域竞争机制引入方式研究

在政府进行较强程度规制甚至直接进行垄断经营的体制下,基础设施领域的低效运营状况几乎不可避免。基础设施领域各产业独特的技术经济特性决定了竞争机制引入方式的多样性;应针对不同类型的基础设施,采取增加生产者数量、利用潜在进入者和替代产品的威胁、增强买方和供方的侃价能力等多种方式引入竞争机制。政府应采取打破政府在基础设施领域的垄断、以合同约束取代行政管理、建立统一高效的监管体系、完善公共收费和支出体系、重新界定现有行业主管部门的职能等措施,为各种竞争机制的顺利引入创造条件。     

REGULATORY REFORM: LESSONS FOR NATURAL GAS PIPELINES

This article examines regulatory reform and some possible consequences of reform designed to increase the role that competition plays in the interstate natural gas pipeline industry. The analysis first provides a conceptual framework for viewing the "problem of natural monopoly" as a basis for regulation. It summarizes ways in which introducing competition for a market may be possible even if competition within a market is not possible–through competitive auctions, monopolistic competition, or contestability. The analysis then relates briefly to this framework the experiences of three U.S. industries that have undergone substantial reform during recent years–airlines, motor carriers, and railroads. Finally, it compares the natural gas pipeline industry with the others examined and suggests types of regulatory reform that might succeed–and those that might not succeed–in improving resource allocation.     

垄断行业定价的博弈分析--以铁路票价制定为例

铁路行业被认为是典型的自然垄断行业。长期以来中国政府对铁路部门实行较为严格的管制政策。但近年来铁路部门已经逐渐实行自主定价,并在春节等节假日上浮票价,引发很多争论。用博弈论方法对铁路票价制定和消费者购买行为进行经济学分析,提出铁路票价制定有其利益趋向依据,但为规范其行为,应当实行价格听证制度和严格的审计监察制度。     

Security and the Subsurface: Natural Gas and the Visualisation of Possibility Spaces

ABSTRACT

Beneath the surface of the United Kingdom lies a sprawling natural gas infrastructure. Based on recent (2014/15) ‘follow the thing’ fieldwork conducted in the UK onshore gas industry, this paper explores the ways that dangers related to the subterranean circulation of natural gas come to be visualised, and how these visualisations make possible different security interventions. These practices are shown to be limited by the ground, which despite its enrolment as a security device conceals from view the shifting landscapes of risk that surround these gaseous movements. Drawing on Manuel DeLanda's concept of the possibility space, I provide a conceptual framework for attending to security’s visualisation practices, describing how attempts are made to overcome the subsurface obfuscation of natural gas. I argue that, rather than being understood as a process of circulatory ‘filtration’ or ‘maintenance’, security must instead be regarded as a series of transformative practices of ecological (re)organisation that are predicated upon the visualisation of entities’ spaces of possibility. In the process, I provide an account of how the three-dimensional geographies and materialities of gas circulations and their milieus are intimately tied up in their governance and politics.     

行政性垄断导致行业生产成本低效

本文首先从产权和地区两个维度研究了行政性垄断对行业生产成本的影响,发现高行政性进入壁垒条件下的国有产权低效与地方政府扭曲要素价格造成的要素省际流动障碍,是造成行业生产成本无效率的主要原因。其次,依据行政性垄断对各行业生产效率的影响程度,建立了各行业行政性垄断程度的判定体系,考察了工业部门各行业的行政性垄断程度。最后,选取若干代表性行业对行政性垄断引致的成本无效进行了实证测算。