Recent power outages in Argentina are largely the result of transmission problems that could be solved by more investment. Private concessionaires now operate the main and regional networks, but they are under no obligation to expand capacity. In a decentralized electricity market such as...

In 1990, Argentina privatized its state-owned telephone company, ENTel. Shifting telecommunications to the private sector was one of the first actions taken under the reform program of the new president, Carlos Saul Menem. In privatizing ENTel, the government focused on privatization as a way of...

Flat-rated internet pricing is increasingly becoming the most common mode of dial-up access nowadays. However, the debate about whether ISP bound telephone calls should also be unmetered is still open. On the one side, consumers and ISPs complain about the high costs of telephone calls and...

With the passing of the Economic Emergency Act in January 2002 which froze all public utility rates and simultaneously devalued the local currency, Argentina entered a period of systematic breaches of the guarantees granted by the government to public utility investors in the early nineties....

Metering water consumption has been long advocated by economists in developing countries as a way to curb waste and prevent resource depletion. However, very few of these economists have studied the inefficiencies brought about by universal metering or the conditions under which decentralized...

Marginal cost pricing of running water and sewerage services has long been the default recommendation of economists and natural resource specialists to firms and local governments. However, water pricing has never been studied simultaneously with the water metering problem before. The socially...

The signing of a concession contract for the Buenos Aires water and sanitation system in December 1992, attracted worldwide attention, and caused considerable controversy in Argentina. It was one of the worlds largest concessions, but the case was also interesting for other reasons. The...

Transparent, rule-based decisionmaking is important to maintaining public trust in regulated infrastructure. The Buenos Aires water and sanitation concession led to remarkable improvements in delivery and coverage of services and to lower prices for consumers. But a poor information base, lack...

The debate on whether natural disasters cause significant macroeconomic impacts and indeed hinder development is ongoing. Most analyses along these lines have focused on impacts on gross domestic product. This paper looks beyond this standard national accounting aggregate, and examines whether...