国有企业民营化改制的理论和实践约束

民营化作为国有企业产权改制的主要方式不能动摇,但必须重点研究国有企业民营化的约束机制.其中,产权理论难有实质性突破和企业内部利益均衡模型难以真正形成构成了国企民营化的理论约束;部门间就业转移阻滞、分级所有的国资管理体制、利益集团行为刚性、财政资源紧张与补偿制度缺失形成对国有企业民营化的实践约束.摆脱这些约束,国有企业民营化才能顺利地进行下去.     

Privatization in a Small Open Economy with Imperfect Competition

We look at privatization in a general equilibrium model of a small, tariff‐distorted, open economy. There is a differentiated good produced by both private and public sector enterprises. A reduction in government production in order to cut losses from such production raises the returns to capital and increases the tariff revenue, which are welfare‐improving. However, privatization also leads to lower wages and possibly fewer private brands. This lowers workers’ welfare, which may make privatization politically infeasible. Privatization can improve workers’ welfare with complementary reforms, e.g., attracting foreign investment or trade liberalization.     

Post–Privatization Effects of Management and Employee Buy–outs

Management and employee buy–outs have played a significant role in the privatization of state–owned enterprises. Key research and policy issues are raised concerning whether insider ownership promotes or impedes restructuring and adaptation. This paper reviews and synthesizes studies of the effects of privatization management and employee buy–outs in both developed and transition economies. Trends in privatization buy–outs and conceptual issues concerning the expected effects of privatization buy–outs both in terms of performance and survival are discussed. A review of empirical evidence is presented in terms of the impact of buy–outs on employee attitudes, human resource management, strategy and restructuring, financial and economic performance, together with fresh evidence on survival. Privatization buy–outs can lead to significant restructuring but their impact depends on institutional context and policy. Restructuring may be greater where insiders purchase shares rather than acquiring them virtually free through voucher programmes.     

Strategic Privatization in Developing Countries

Privatization of state‐owned enterprises may have important welfare implications, in particular in less developed economies where markets are small and domestic firms are typically relatively weak, both technologically and financially. In these environments, a high‐tech foreign investor acquiring the state‐owned assets may end up dominating the local market, thereby harming local consumer and producer interests. A foreign investor, however, is likely to be both willing and able to offer a higher bid for the assets than local investors. This paper addresses the trade‐off for local governments between privatization revenues and foreign market power. The authors find that there may be an incentive to privatize “strategically” by selling the state‐owned firm to a local (less advanced) investor at a lower price in order to achieve a more competitive post‐privatization market structure.     

The results of ‘mass privatization’in Romania: A first empirical study1

This paper provides an assessment of the contribution to privatization in Romania of the 1995-96 Mass Privatization Programme (MPP), which offered shares in nearly 5,000 companies to citizens in exchange for coupons. Analysing a comprehensive database of MPP companies, we find that an average of only 18.7 per cent of these companies' shares were actually transferred to Romanian citizens, and only 7.8 per cent of the companies were majority privatized (on a size-weighted basis). We estimate that the MPP accounted for only about 5.5 per cent of the value of state-owned enterprise assets inherited from the socialist period. The design of the programme created highly dispersed ownership structures, which is likely to generate particularly difficult problems in the many small companies in the programme. We place our findings in the context of the history of Romanian privatization policies since 1990, and provide some comparisons with mass privatization programmes in other countries. We also analyse the implications of the MPP for the corporate governance and the restructuring of enterprises.     

Privatization, strategic foreign direct investment and host-country welfare

Recent evidence shows that developing countries and transition economies are increasingly privatizing their public firms and at the same time experiencing rapid growth of inward foreign direct investment (FDI). We show that there is a two-way causality between privatization and greenfield FDI. Privatization increases the incentive for FDI, which, in turn, increases the incentive for privatization compared to the situation of no FDI. The optimal degree of privatization depends on the cost difference of the firms, and on the foreign firm's mode of entry.     

PRIVATIZATION AND PERFORMANCE: THE CASE OF FOUR AUSTRALIAN FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS

ABSTRACT: This paper investigates the performance after privatization of institutions in Australian banking and insurance. Privatization was anticipated to improve firm performance in Australia and elsewhere, yet findings are mixed. A comparative institutional approach is taken to analyzing firm performance in the longer term which allows for further structural change. A CAMEL analysis of performance before and after privatization events is undertaken for four privatized institutions, two each from banking and insurance sectors. These are matched with private peer institutions. Privatized institutions are found to perform quite similarly to private peer institutions both before and after privatization.     

Privatization and Its Benefits: Theory and Evidence

Privatization has been a key component of structural reformprograms in both developed and developing economies. The aimof such programs is to achieve higher microeconomic efficiencyand foster economic growth, as well as reduce public sectorborrowing requirements through the elimination of unnecessarysubsidies. Microeconomic theory tells us that incentive andcontracting problems create inefficiencies due to public ownership,given that managers of state-owned enterprises pursue objectivesthat differ from those of private firms (political view) andface less monitoring (management view). Not only are the managers'objectives distorted, but the budget constraints they face arealso softened. The soft-budget constraint emerges from the factthat bankruptcy is not a credible threat to public managers,for it is in the central government's own interest to bail themout in case of financial distress. Empirical evidence showsa robust corroboration of theoretical implications: privatizationincreases profitability and efficiency in both competitive andmonopolistic sectors. Full privatization has a greater impactthan partial privatization and monopolistic sectors show anincrease in profitability that is above the component explainedby increases in productivity, which reflects their market power.From the macroeconomic perspective, no conclusive evidence canbe drawn, but the trends are favorable. (JEL D21, D61, D62,E65)     

Privatizations around the world: economic or political determinants?

The article examines economic, political, and institutional determinants of privatization using a panel of 50 countries over the period of 1988–2006. Our sample includes developed, developing, and transition economies. Privatization activity is measured by the number of privatization deals as well as the revenue raised and analyzed using the negative binomial regression and Tobit regression respectively. Although more privatization activity is usually taking place in countries displaying satisfactory economic performance in some respect, the role of economic factors turns out to be limited. The results identify a number of political and institutional determinants but some effects are specific to a particular type of economy. For example, in developing countries, right‐wing governments are associated with privatizations while new, not necessarily right‐wing governments, are behind privatization in Eastern Europe. The role of financial development is also varied, with sound financial institutions related to successful privatization in developed and developing countries but not in transition economies.     

The missing shock: the macroeconomic impact of British Privatizations

In this paper the impact of privatization on macroeconomic performance in the United Kingdom is tested using quarterly data from 1979 to 1999. Privatization proceeds have been included in a simple analytical framework dealing with both demand and supply-side of the economy. Multivariate cointegration techniques have been used in order to consider the nonstationarity of the time series involved. The empirical results show that privatizations have no long-run effects on output in the UK. This result is consistent with microeconomic evidence that shows that in the UK ownership change per se had little impact on long term productivity trends. Moreover it is found that privatization proceeds have contributed to sustaining public expenditures.     

Does privatization improve the environment?

Privatization towards profit maximization lowers output and hence encourages a lower tax rate. Because of the reduced tax effect, output is increased when the demand function is highly convex. This gives a paradoxical result that privatization harms the environment.     

城市公用事业民营化改革的复杂性研究

我国城市公用事业民营化改革处于初始阶段且有加速推行的迹象,但改革的微观模式尚没有厘清。从理论上看,城市公用事业民营化在技术不变的情况下,无论禀赋是否增加,均非帕累托改善。从实际上看,城市公用事业民营化也会产生诸多的政策困境,且有两难的特点,其中包括民营化与固定回报;价格调整与普遍服务;特许经营中的垄断与竞争;市场准入门槛的高与低等一系列操作性难题。加之,民营化易引发的腐败和失业等负面效应。因此,必须建立符合我国国情的城市公用事业民营化改革模式。     

PRIVATIZATION AND THE LABOUR GOVERNMENTS 1997–2010

The history of privatization, first under the Margaret Thatcher Governments from 1979 to 1990 and then under the two John Major Governments between 1990 and 1997, has been extensively researched. However, there has been relatively little attention paid to the privatization policies of the Labour Governments between May 1997 and May 2010. Despite Labour opposing each of the Conservatives’ privatizations during the 1980s and 1990s, privatization continued after 1997 and especially in the form of PFI schemes. The study provides a comprehensive review of privatization under Labour Governments and confirms that there was a remarkable degree of policy continuity after 1997 with some privatizations postponed by the Conservatives completed under Labour. The paper draws on official reports and documents. It also draws on records that I was given access to as the UK Government's Official Historian of Privatization.     

Privatization and Utility Regulation in Developing Countries: the Lessons So Far

The privatization of utilities has grown in developing countries in recent years. Privatization transactions for the utilities sector have accounted for over a third of all sales in developing countries since 1988. The introduction of privatization has not necessarily meant more competition. Consequently, utility privatization has led in many cases to the creation of regulatory structures that aim to protect consumers from monopoly abuse and to provide incentives to firms to maintain efficiency. Case studies drawing on examples from the telecommunications, electricity and water sectors indicate that creating effective regulation and a competitive environment is a difficult and slow process. The cases have shown that regulation rather than privatization achieved the largest gains. Similarly, although the variety of regulatory measures that have been introduced have made a difference, the most tangible benefits, particularly to consumers, result from the establishment of competition. The case studies have shown that privatization has preceded the development of effective regulation and competition. The development of regulatory structures is constrained by the capacity of governments to enforce regulatory rules and monitor contracts. Fostering conditions that encourage competition and lessen anti-competitive behaviour by incumbents is a beneficial but slow process.     

Does Ownership or Competition Matter? The Effects of Telecommunications Reform on Network Expansion and Efficiency

I use newly released data from the International Telecommunications Union to examine the effects of privatization and competition on network expansion and efficiency. Using a fixed-effects model, I find that during the 1986-1995 time period, those countries that have at least fifty percent of the assets of their main telecommunications provider in the private sector have significantly higher main lines per 100 inhabitants and, to a lesser degree, have higher growth in main lines per 100 inhabitants. There is no evidence, however, that privatization leads to higher growth in main lines per 100 inhabitants in those countries whose GDP per capita is less than $10,000. Privatization is positively associated with main lines per employee and growth in main lines per employee. While competition is not found to affect network expansion, it is found to positively affect efficiency as measured in main lines per employee. In order to account for the possible endogeneity of the privatization and competition dummy variables, all equations are estimated using an instrumental variable approach as well.     

Privatization, water access and affordability: Evidence from Malaysian household expenditure data

The aim of this paper is to examine empirically the impact of privatization on water access and affordability in Malaysia using household expenditure data. The development of water sector in Malaysia in terms of coverage has been fairly uneven. Some states have privatized their water supply sector while others have not. The overall finding of this study is that the impact of privatization on access and affordability in the Malaysian water supply sector is ambiguous. Privatization does not seem to have improved access to treated water from network in Malaysia. A likely explanation of this is the role played by the government in the sector in terms of tariff regulation and universal service provision. Furthermore, privatization does not seem to have adversely affected affordability in the sector. In addition to political intervention in tariff regulation, this could be due to the government maintaining a significant stake in privatized water companies.     

The effect of privatization on wealth distribution in Russia

The paper considers the Russian privatization process and examines how its deviation from the competitive sale standard was likely to affect wealth inequality. (Privatization here is defined narrowly as the transfer of existing assets from government ownership to private hands.) While empirical evaluation is all but impossible due to the dearth of reliable data, it is feasible to analyze the institutional features of Russian privatization in terms of their effect on redistribution of wealth. The paper argues that the most relevant and interesting issue is to evaluate privatization's distributional consequences relative to the informal pre-reform property rights. In light of this, privatization is modelled as a rent-seeking contest with incumbency advantage of enterprise managers who initially held the greatest informal rights over assets. The rent-seeking contest is shown to strongly magnify this pre-reform wealth inequality reflected in the incumbency advantage.
In addition, the paper analyzes the distributional consequences for various wealth groups of the differences in the composition of their pre-reform informal wealth, most importantly a relatively large share of housing assets in the wealth of the poor. The effect of wealth redistribution on economic growth in Russia is also discussed.     

Efficiency effect of privatization in the developing countries

Privatization gained considerable momentum in the developing world in the 1980s. The motives were many, but the hope for higher economic efficiency underlined the expectations of the implementing governments and agencies in the developing countries. While the merits of a market-based economic system are well established under certain theoretical conditions, far less is known of its empirical relevance in the developing world. Yet, to the best of the author's knowledge, no empirical study has examined the macro-efficiency effect of privatization in the developing countries. Studies concerned with this issue often limit themselves to the impact of privatization at the firm level for a small number of companies and countries. Thus, the current study is an attempt to provide a systematic quantitative measure of the magnitude of the macroeconomic effect of privatization in 45 developing countries. Using the concept of frontier production function, efficiency differences between developing countries with differing degrees of private sector contribution in the economy are estimated. The empirical findings suggest, ceteris paribus, that developing countries can increase the utility of their national resources by approximately 45% simply by converting to market-based economies.     

Does privatization remove restrictive working practices? Evidence from UK establishments

This study investigates the links between privatization and changes in working practices using data from the UK 1990 Workplace Employees Relations Survey. Privatization raises the probability of an establishment of experiencing reduced job demarcation and/or increased flexibility in the use of the workforce by managers. After exploration no clear association is found between ownership and the level of restrictive working practices.     

Search for financial returns and social security privatization

I develop a general equilibrium model in which the quality of household financial decisions is endogenously determined by the incentives to exert effort in learning about financial opportunities. The model generates predictions for asset market participation and returns across households. Moreover, search for financial returns enables the model to generate a more skewed equilibrium wealth distribution. In this context, social security privatization affects household search effort, asset market participation and the competitiveness of the asset market. Privatization reduces average welfare and this reduction is somewhat magnified by the search friction. While some have suggested that household decision making could be important for the consequences of privatization, my analysis does not bear this out.