This paper provides a cross-country efficiency analysis of electricity distribution companies in East European transition countries (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary). We compare the relative technical efficiency of East European regional distribution companies (RDCs) among...

Revenue cap regulation is often combined with systematic benchmarking to reveal the managerial inefficiencies when regulating natural monopolies. One example is the European energy sector, where benchmarking methods are based on actual cost data, which are influenced by managerial inefficiency...

This paper analyses the consequences of the planned enlargement on the EU budget for the years 2007 and 2013. It concentrates on the EU's Common Agricultural Policy and Structural Policy and calculates the possible fiscal consequences of enlarging the EU for various policy scenarios. Enlarging...

This article presents an integrated electricity dispatch and load flow model with endogenous electricity generation capacity expansion. The target is to quantify generation capacity requirements for 2030 and where within Central Europe it shall be ideally placed when taking into account the...

The transformation of the European energy system requires substantial investment in transmission capacity to facilitate cross-border trade and to efficiently integrate renewable energy sources. However, network planning in the EU is still mainly a national prerogative. In contrast to other...

With Germany's nuclear phase-out, 23 reactors need to be dismantled in the near future. Initiated by the dire financial situation of the affected utilities in 2014, a major discourse on ensuring financial liability led to a redistribution of liabilities and finances, with the utilities remaining...

Lack of transmission capacity hampers the integration of the European electricity market, and thereby precludes reaping the full benefits of competition. In this work, we investigate the extent to which transmission grid expansion promotes competition, efficiency and welfare. To this end, we...

Theoretical work based on social identity theory and in-group favoritism predicts that increased population diversity (e.g., due to immigration) reduces support for redistributive public policies. In this article, we add to the empirical literature testing this prediction in three ways. First,...

We study political determinants of municipality amalgamations during a boundary reform in the German state of Brandenburg, which reduced the number of municipalities from 1,489 to 421. The analysis is conducted using data on the political decision makers as well as fiscal and socio-economic...

In many countries, important features of municipal government (such as the electoral system, mayors' salaries, and the number of councillors) depend on whether the municipality is above or below arbitrary population thresholds. Several papers have used a regression discontinuity design (RDD) to...