Is Economic Regulation Possible? Arrow's Impossibility Theorem and the Management of Joint Use Infrastructure
Access Status
Authors
Date
2007Type
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Source Title
Source Conference
Additional URLs
Faculty
Collection
Abstract
Economic regulation is portrayed as the objective application of clear economic theory to data in order to develop outcomes which overcome the problems associated with natural monopoly in a non-political, unbiased fashion. However, is the appearance of objectivity only skin-deep? This paper argues that it is; that economic regulation is a form of social choice and that the need for subjective assumptions underpinning regulatory forecasts renders this social choice subject to Arrow?s (1950) Impossibility Theorem. The same is true of any public-sector resource allocation process. The paper examines the consequences of this result for economic regulation using railways as a case study, and charts some potential policy options in response.
Related items
Showing items related by title, author, creator and subject.
-
Tonts, Matthew A. (1998)This thesis examines economic restructuring and changing governmental regulation in the Central Wheatbelt of Western Australia. It argues that, for much of this century, Australian governments were committed to the ...
-
Gurrib, Muhammad Ikhlaas (2008)This study gives an insight into the behaviour and performance of large speculators and large hedgers in 29 US futures markets. Using a trading determinant model and priced risk factors such as net positions and sentiment ...
-
Rengasamy, Dhanuskodi (2012)BANKS play very important roles in the economic development of nations as they, to a large extent, wield control over the supply of money in circulation and are the main stimuli of economic progress. Economic development ...