The Performance of German Water Utilities: A (Semi)-Parametric Analysis

Michael Zschille and Matthias Walter ()

No 1118, Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin from DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research

Abstract: Germany's water supply industry is characterized by a multitude of utilities and widely diverging prices, possibly resulting from structural differences beyond the control of firms' management, but also from inefficiencies. In this article we use Data Envelopment Analysis and Stochastic Frontier Analysis to determine the utilities' technical efficiency scores based on cross-sectional data from 373 public and private water utilities in 2006. We find large differences in technical efficiency scores even after accounting for significant structural variables like network density, share of groundwater usage and water losses.

Keywords: Water supply; technical efficiency; data envelopment analysis; stochastic frontier analysis; structural variables; bootstrapped truncated regression (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C14 L95 Q25 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 p.
Date: 2011
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff and nep-eur
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The performance of German water utilities: a (semi)-parametric analysis (2012)
Working Paper: The Performance of German Water Utilities: A (Semi)-Parametric Analysis (2011)
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