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The economic benefits of regulatory reform
Sveinbjörn Blöndal and Dirk Pilat
This paper assesses the potential impact of regulatory reform in five sectors (electricity, air and road transport, telecommunications and distribution) on sectoral and economy-wide performance in five OECD countries, namely the United States, Japan, Germany, France and the United Kingdom. The estimates suggest scope for significant ef ficiency and GDP gains, particularly in the more heavily regulated economies of Japan, Germany and France. The ef fects of reform remain dif ficult to assess, however, in particular with respect to the dynamic benefits. The paper also discusses the transition costs that may be associated with regulatory reform, including the possible ef fects on employment.
Globalisation and linkages: macro-structural challenges and opportunities
Pete Richardson (editor)
This paper, part of the Organisation-wide study entitled "Towards a New Global Age", examines macrostructural economic developments in and between OECD and non-OECD economies, the economic linkages and structural factors and policies which have influenced growth performance. It goes on to consider forwardlooking macroeconomic scenarios to 2020 based on dif ferent hypotheses about economic policies and other factors influencing factor productivity developments. A final section provides a model-based evaluation of the potential influence of some of the key factors underlying these scenarios, in particular population ageing and alternative fiscal policies.
What do countries really spend on social policies? A comparative note
Willem Adema
This note presents indicators on net public social expenditure to provide a better and more comparable picture of social ef fort across countries. The note describes and explains how budgetary expenditure data are adjusted to account for mandatory private expenditures, taxation of cash transfers, indirect taxation of consumption out of benefits and tax breaks for social purposes. The initial estimates of net social expenditures for six countries indicate a significant convergence of levels of social ef fort across countries when these are considered within a more comprehensive framework which accounts for fiscal and legislative arrangements rather than just budget allocations.
Technology and non-technology determinants of export share growth
Evangelos Ioannidis and Paul Schreyer
The paper provides empirical evidence on determinants of industry-level export shares, emphasising the role of technology-related factors. Main conclusions are: i) technology-related factors are important determinants of export shares, operating via product innovation in high-technology industries, often with a segmented market structure. The positive ef fects of process innovation are mainly found in low-technology and/or fragmented industries, together with other non-technology factors (e.g. wages, exchange rates); ii) no systematic influence of embodied technology on export performance was detected; iii) much of the variability of export shares for each industry is explained by demand fluctuations of exporting countries’ main markets.
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