13.04.2022 • 8/2022
From Pandemic to Energy Crisis: Economy and Politics under Permanent Stress
The German economy is steering through difficult waters and faces the highest inflation rates in decades. In their spring report, the leading German economic research institutes revise their outlook for this year significantly downward. The recovery from the COVID-19 crisis is slowing down as a result of the war in Ukraine, but remains on track. The institutes expect GDP to increase by 2.7% and 3.1% in 2022 and 2023 respectively. In the event of an immediate interruption to Russian gas supplies, a total of 220 billion euros in German economic output would be at risk in both years.
Oliver Holtemöller
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Economic Effects of Investment Grants for Water and Sewerage Infrastructure – The Case of Saxony
Peter Haug
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 11,
2010
Abstract
The article deals with the regional economic growth effects of the German “Joint Scheme” for the improvement of regional economic structures (“GA-Infra”). It focuses on water and sewerage projects located in the federal state of Saxony (Germany) during the funding period 2000-2007. Evaluating these projects is important for scientific as well as for economic policy reasons.
First of all, according to general economic theory, the potential direct and indirect supply-side effects of the water and sewerage infrastructure as well as the price effects caused by this infrastructure are relevant for location decisions only to certain branches of the manufacturing industry.
Subsidies for the development of the sewerage infrastructure have been granted mostly according to the growth target of regional policy, i.e. primarily to municipalities with above-average volumes of industry sewage. This finding could not be confirmed for water provision.
A regression analysis (estimating the labour demand of the local manufacturing industry) showed no empirical evidence for any relationship between the changes in labour demand and the amount of GA-Infra funded water and sewerage infrastructure investments. This might be a consequence of the already satisfactory development condition of the infrastructure in question at the beginning of the funding period (“ubiquitous infrastructure”).
According to a survey of local governments conducted by the IWH, these results might be explained by the fact that business customers did not benefit from price reductions despite the GA-Infra funding granted to their local water and sewage disposal providers. Even though there might be some intuitively plausible reasons (decreasing population, no connection fees) for these findings, no effect on firm location decisions can be expected under these circumstances.
All in all, we do not consider the further extension of these funding priorities to be necessary. Especially, the GA-Infra water/sewerage grants should neither be used to mitigate the cost effects of demographic changes or regulation nor to compensate for losses caused by the buyer power of large firms.
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Requirements on Regulation Frameworks: What is the Best Way of Securing Efficiency in the Water Sector?
Peter Haug
Competition Policy in Network Industries, INFER Research Perspectives, Vol. 3,
2007
Abstract
The paper investigates the effects of several characteristics of regulatory frameworks in the water sector on the efficiency of water provision. Several requirements on efficient regulatory frameworks suggested in other studies of network industries are modified and others are derived from different economic theories of regulation. The resulting set of criteria is applied to the regulation systems of the Dutch, German and US-American water industry. A comparison of several performance indicators for the three countries suggests that some relationship between the design of regulatory frameworks and the price-quality-ratios in the water sector might exist.
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Economic 'Clusters' in East Germany: Evidence on the Location and the Characteristics of Spatially Concentrated Industries
Martin T. W. Rosenfeld, Peter Franz, Gerhard Heimpold
Post-Communist Economies,
No. 1,
2007
Abstract
The contribution provides empirical findings, which regions in East Germany show spatially concentrated industries possessing ”cluster” qualities. The latter are regarded as being existent if spatially concentrated industries coincide with networking activities and innovative competences. The findings reveal that spatially concentrated industries possessing the qualities sketched are relatively rare, and they are, if existent, primarily located in the East German agglomerated spaces. This in mind, the article draws the conclusion, that spreading regional policy schemes by the “watering can principle” should be avoided. Instead, the resources should be concentrated on locations where spatially concentrated industries are existent. Networks and innovative competences should be strengthened there.
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Local Government Control and Efficiency of the Water Industry: An Empirical Analysis of Water Suppliers in East Germany
Peter Haug
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 3,
2007
Abstract
The paper deals with the effects of local governments’ interference with business affairs of publicly owned utilities. A partial model is presented to illustrate the consequences of “democratic control” for the public managers’ effort and the efficiency of local public production. To check the theoretical results empirically, a two-stage data envelopment analysis (DEA) is carried out for a sample of East German water suppliers. The organisational form is used as a measure for the degree of municipal control. The results of the OLS- and Tobit regression indicate an efficiency-enhancing effect of organisational forms with less distinctive control options for local politicians.
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Where are the economic development cores of East Germany? Results of a survey of the focuses of branches, enterprise networks and innovative competence fields in the East German Regions
Peter Franz, Gerhard Heimpold, Martin T. W. Rosenfeld
Regionale Strukturpolitik - quo vadis?, Informationen zur Raumentwicklung, Heft 9,
No. 9,
2006
Abstract
The contribution presents the results of an empirical study conducted by the Halle Institute for Economic Research on behalf of the Federal Office for Building and Regional Planning. The study concerns the identification of “regional clusters” for all spatial planning regions in East Germany. As criteria to identify clusters, three components were taken into consideration: spatially concentrated industries, enterprise networks and innovative competence fields, whereas, for the purpose of identifying “clusters”, the networks and innovative competences have to show a co-incidence with the industry which is spatially concentrated. Cases of co-incidence of all three elements were categorised as economic development cores (or spots), i. e. as forms of spatially concentrated economic activities which show cluster-relevant qualities. For regions which possess economic development spots, the growth perspectives can be expected as more favourable in comparison with other regions. The findings show a particularly high concentration of economic development spots in the Berlin region as well as in the Federal States of Saxony and Thuringia, where the cities of Dresden, Leipzig, Erfurt and Chemnitz form delineating points within which a particularly high number of economic development spots are existent. As a consequence, the study might initiate a debate in favour of a stronger spatial concentration of regional policy measures instead of spreading the resources by “watering can principle”.
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How good are German water suppliers? – Critical remarks on the “industry image of the German water industry” – a comment
Peter Haug
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 4,
2006
Abstract
Seit längerem bestehen in Deutschland Zweifel an der Effizienz des vorwiegend kommunalen Wasser- und Abwassersektors. Hinzu kommt, daß – zumindest hinsichtlich kaufmännischer Daten – keine amtlichen Erhebungen oder sonstigen allgemein zugänglichen Datenquellen für diesen Bereich existieren und somit die wasserwirtschaftlichen Verbände ein „Datenmonopol“ besitzen. Von verschiedenen Seiten, z. B. im sog. „Ewers-Gutachten“ aus dem Jahr 2001, wurde daher eine erhöhte Transparenz der Wasserwirtschaft als Anreiz zur Effizienzsteigerung angemahnt, insbesondere über obligatorische und öffentliche Leistungsvergleiche der Wasserversorger á la Niederlande.
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