Productive efficiency and regulatory reform: The case of vehicle inspection services

Francesc Trillas, Daniel Montolio and Néstor Duch Brown

No CREAP2006-02, Working Papers from Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP)

Abstract: Measuring productive efficiency provides information on the likely effects of regulatory reform. We present a Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) of a sample of 38 vehicle inspection units under a concession regime, between the years 2000 and 2004. The differences in efficiency scores show the potential technical efficiency benefit of introducing some form of incentive regulation or of progressing towards liberalization. We also compute scale efficiency scores, showing that only units in territories with very low population density operate at a sub-optimal scale. Among those that operate at an optimal scale, there are significant differences in size; the largest ones operate in territories with the highest population density. This suggests that the introduction of new units in the most densely populated territories (a likely effect of some form of liberalization) would not be detrimental in terms of scale efficiency. We also find that inspection units belonging to a large, diversified firm show higher technical efficiency, reflecting economies of scale or scope at the firm level. Finally, we show that between 2002 and 2004, a period of high regulatory uncertainty in the sample’s region, technical change was almost zero. Regulatory reform should take due account of scale and diversification effects, while at the same time avoiding regulatory uncertainty.

Keywords: Productive Efficiency; Regulatory Reform; Vehicle Inspections. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 29 pages
Date: 2006-09, Revised 2006-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff and nep-reg
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (30)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.xreap.cat/RePEc/xrp/pdf/CREAP2006-02.pdf First version, 2006 (application/pdf)
http://www.xreap.cat/RePEc/xrp/pdf/CREAP2006-02.pdf Revised version, 2006 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: PRODUCTIVE EFFICIENCY AND REGULATORY REFORM: THE CASE OF VEHICLE INSPECTION SERVICES (2011)
Working Paper: Productive efficiency and regulatory reform: The case of vehicle inspection services (2006)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:xrp:wpaper:creap2006-02

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Xarxa de Referència en Economia Aplicada (XREAP) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by XREAP ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).