Have Consumers Benefited from theReforms in the Electricity Distribution Sector in Latin America?

Estache, Antonio ; Rossi, Martin

World Bank, Washington, D.C.

关键词: AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS;    CONSUMER PRICE INDEX;    CONSUMERS;    DEREGULATION;    DEVELOPING COUNTRIES;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-3420
RP-ID  :  WPS3420

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

The authors bring new empirical evidenceon the impact of the choice of ownership and regulatoryregime on firms' productivity and prices paid byconsumers. They collect the evidence from a sample ofelectricity distribution companies in Latin America. Theauthors rely on estimations of labor and operation andmaintenance (O&M) input requirement functions usingalternative econometric approaches. Their main conclusionsare: 1) Private firms perform better (approximately 30percent) than public firms. 2) The regulatory regimesmatter, so that price-cap regulated firms do better thanrate-of-return regulated firms, and firms regulated underhybrid regimes have intermediate performance. 3) Privatefirms operating under rate of return are at most asefficient as public firms. 4) There is no clear pattern ofdifferences in electricity prices according to theregulatory regime. 5) Final prices fell in general but thedrop did not match the productivity gains, implying that theoperators and the state share some of the gains in the formof rents and higher tax revenue, respectively.