Insurance companies and insurance activities are subject to profuse industry regulation, justified by potential market failures, but this does not exclude the applicability to them of Competition Law. Nevertheless, almost all legal systems worldwide foresee, one way or another, significant...

We study empirically the determinants of public tomb prices in a sample of Spanish towns. We document strong evidence in favor that cemeteries act as local monopolies that use second degree price discrimination to maximize profits. Additionally we report that local cemetery prices react to...

The development of a more competition-oriented public procurement system is possible, on the basis of the principle of competition that is embedded in the EC public procurement Directives. This paper explores the existence of the principle of competition, roughly delimits its scope, and broadly...

On February 7, 2011, the Spanish National Competition Authority (Comisión Nacional de la Competencia, CNC) published its Guide on Public Procurement and Competition with the goal of offering practical recommendations that contribute to the promotion of effective competition in public...

This paper focuses on the treatment of public procurement activities under EC competition law. After briefly outlining the competition economics of public procurement, the paper shows the perceived shortcomings of current EC competition rules and case-law to effectively tackle publicly-generated...

This paper indentifies the two-dimensional relationship that procurement and competition keep. From a ‘market’ perspective, public procurement needs to take place in an environment free from collusion between tenderers, or bid rigging. Public buyers only can achieve value for money if...

This paper assesses the competition law and State aid implications of the CJEU Judgment in Azienda sanitaria locale n. 5 "Spezzino" and Others, C-113/13, EU:C:2014:2440 (Spezzino). It pays particular attention at the departure from the Altmark test for the assessment of public support granted to...

This chapter assesses the use of public procurement to enforce labour standards from a competition and State aid perspective, and concentrates on the establishment of contract compliance clauses under the rules of Article 26 of Directive 2004/18/EC and Article 70 of Directive 2014/24/EU and in...

In this contribution, I reflect on the role of competition in public procurement regulation and, more specifically, on whether competition should be treated as a regulatory goal, as a general principle of public procurement law, as a specific (implicit or explicit) requirement in discrete legal...

(WP 13/03 Clave pdf)The Spanish university system has witnessed many changes. Initial conditions for competition were laid down in 83, specially through the recognition of legal status to private universities. However, the shortage of students since 98 and the drop on demand for higher education...