Suchergebnisse

The most important element in the recent reform of the Common Agricultural Policy, which is intended to reduce the concentration of aid distributed under the direct support system, is the so-called redistributive payment. The redistributive effects of this instrument depend on its specific form implemented at the national level, the level of funding, and the area structure of holdings in a given country. The objective of this paper is to compare the targeting of the support distributed under the redistributive payment in the three new Member States of the European Union – Bulgaria, Lithuania and Poland. In order to achieve this objective, it was established which area groups of holdings benefit from (and which lose out on) the application of the redistributive payment in each country. In addition, the average amount of support for a holding per hectare of agricultural area, and the percentage change in this support due to the introduction of the redistributive payment, depending on the size of the holding, in individual countries, are shown as a function. The source material was the data made available by the ministries of agriculture of the countries under analysis, relating to 2018.

"This paper examines the effect of inefficient redistribution in Myerson's (1993) model of redistributive politics. Regardless of the absolute levels of the efficiency of political parties' transfers to different voter segments, parties have incentive to (stochastically) shift resources away from voter segments with large relative efficiency gaps between the two parties' transfers towards voter segments with smaller relative efficiency gaps. Because of this dependence on relative, and not absolute, levels of efficiency, the parties/ optimal strategies may lead to large discrepancies between the sum of the budgetary transfers and the sum of the effective transfers. At the extreme, in the spirit of Magee, Brock, and Young (1989), we obtain 'black hole' inefficiency. When the model is extended to allow for loyal voter segments and loyalty to a party is positively related to the efficiency of that party's transfers to the segment, the incentives leading to black hole inefficiency become even stronger." (author's abstract)

The European programs, the direct and coupled payments for assistance and funding of the agricultural sector are part of the policy of the European Union aiming to create an opportunity for employment and active participation of the people from rural areas and to provide them with options for earning a sustainable income in these poorly urbanized locations. The direct payments form a part of the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union and can be divided into several main types: Single Area Payment Scheme (SAPS), Redistributive Payments and Small Farmers Scheme intended to support small farms with a view to increasing the competitiveness in the field of small-scale agriculture. The purpose of this article is to analyze the economic and the social effects of the direct payments developmental impact during the first and the second programming periods. In order to achieve the present goal, an inquiry has been conducted together with a few in-depth interviews with small farmers who receive financial support in this way. The article contains the results of the inquiry involving leaseholders and farmers, conducted in North-East Bulgaria.

Decoupled direct payments were introduced in the European Union (EU) by the 2003 CAP reform in form of the Single Payment Scheme (SPS) and the Single Area Payment System (SAPS). The 2013 CAP reform changed both the implementation of decoupled payments as well as its budget. We assess the possible effects of the 2013 CAP reform on the capitalization of decoupled payments in land rental values. Our estimates suggest that the CAP reform leads to an increase in the capitalization of decoupled payments by additional 16 cents for each EUR of decoupled payments relative to the pre-reform situation. However, there is a relatively large variation in the reform effects between MS particularly between Old Member States (OMS) and New MS (NMS). In NMS the capitalization rate slightly reduces from 76% in the pre-reform period to 72% in the post-reform period. Although, the rate is significantly lower in OMS, it almost doubles (from 20% to 39%) due to the reform. The main source of the post-reform capitalization in the EU are the entitlement stock changes accounting for 19% of total post-reform capitalization level, followed by the internal convergence of payments with 18%, the budget change (including external convergence) with 1%, and the differentiation of payments (redistributive payment) with -7%. Overall, our estimates suggest that on average in the EU, the non-farming landowners' policy gains are 25% of total decoupled payments in the post-reform period compared to 17% in the pre-reform period.

Background: In Italy, copayment has changed its nature and it can no longer be simply considered a system to curb inappropriate expenditure. It has become an important form of revenue for public health care provision, but it might also become a source of distortions in income and health benefits redistribution. Methods: We use a rich administrative dataset gathering information on patients demand (whose records have been matched to income declared for tax purposes) to study the effects of an additional copayment (the so called "superticket" introduced by the Italian government in 2012) in Lombardy, the biggest Italian Region whose socio-economic dimension is comparable to that of many European countries (e.g., the Netherlands, Switzerland, etc.). Results: Our analysis shows that at the aggregate level the non-uniform superticket schedule adopted in Lombardy is slightly pro-poor, but this result coexists with evidences pointing towards possible cases of restriction to access caused by the additional copayment. Conclusions: The introduction of the superticket and the ensuing increase in the out-of pocket payment for health care raises questions about the distribution of the burden among patients, and the sustainability of the extra revenue through time. This issue needs to be further investigated by combining health status data with the information in this dataset.

Investments in major transport infrastructure projects involve a significant mobilisation of economic resources both for construction and operation. In these projects, to assess the efficiency of the resources used, decision-makers usually use cost-benefit analysis (CBA). This key element of welfare economics is carried out taking into account the effects for society as a whole. Social welfare is thus measured independently of who are the components of society receiving the benefits or suffering the costs. However, besides the best use of resources, which should be always ensured, transport projects often have other objectives. These objectives, which are ideally defined by the political programs of elected decision-makers, often involve redistributive effects. Favouring the economic development of less advanced regions is, for instance, an argument that is used to justify territorial biases in investment. Practitioners have increasingly tried to identify redistributive effects to both create awareness of their existence and to quantify them in order to incorporate them rigorously in project appraisal. Intergenerational redistributive effects due to the financial scheme adopted for the project are a kind of redistributive effects that has neither been properly highlighted nor researched until now. The actual payments to cover the costs of projects unfolding over long timespans depend on the financing formula chosen and affect taxpayers and/or users of different generations. When transport investments are directly covered by the annual budgets of public administrations, they are paid by the taxpayers of the construction period but benefit users that will live in decades ahead. However, if the project is financed through loans, their payment schedule will define a very different financial time-profile. Relating the payments profile with the benefits produced by the project, which occur over its life cycle, can indicate the fairness of the distribution of expenditure and benefits across the successive generations ...

Cet article présente une analyse des montants d'aides directes versés aux exploitations agricoles européennes en 1995 et à horizon 2008, après simulation des effets de la réforme de l'Agenda 2000. Conduite à partir du Réseau d'information comptable agricole (RICA), cette analyse distingue 31 zones géographiques et 5 types d'exploitations. En 1995, le montant d'aides directes par exploitation agricole est, en moyenne communautaire, de 7 500 euros, soit 4 800 euros/emploi et 265 euros/hectare. La concentration des aides directes est importante : 20% des exploitations reçoivent 73% des aides directes, pour 59% des superficies et seulement 25% des emplois. La prochaine réforme de la PAC (Agenda 2000) devrait entraîner une revalorisation des aides directes d'environ 7 milliards d'euros sur l'ensemble de l'Union européenne, dont 90% relèvent des productions bovines. Pour un type de production donné, la répartition du soutien direct entre exploitations est peu modifiée, les aides directes étant toujours versées de manière proportionnelle aux facteurs de productions détenus. Après Agenda 2000, le montant d'aides directes par exploitation restera, en moyenne, inférieur à 5 000 euros dans la plupart des zones du sud de l'Union européenne. Il dépassera les 30 000 euros en Finlande et au Royaume-Uni.

There is a growing public and political interest in effects of agricultural policy on income distribuion in the agricultural sector. Most of the literature regarding redistributive effects of agricultural policy is ex-post and static in nature and many tools for an ex-ante analysis of impacts of sectoral or macroeconomic policies depict farm groups or representative farms rather than individual farms. However, the measurement of inequality is highly sensitive to the aggregation of individual data. In this paper, redistributive effects of an abolishment of different instruments of the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) are analysed with a tool that is able to consistently assess impacts of sectoral policy on individual farm incomes. We find that an abolishment of the main components of the CAP, direct payments and market and price policies, results in a more unequal income distribution in relative terms, but a more equal income distribution in absolute terms. Based on the latter, we conclude that if the CAP aims at a more equal income distrbution within the agricultural sector, then significant scope for improving the design of respective policy instruments exists.

There is a growing public and political interest in effects of agricultural policy on income distribuion in the agricultural sector. Most of the literature regarding redistributive effects of agricultural policy is ex-post and static in nature and many tools for an ex-ante analysis of impacts of sectoral or macroeconomic policies depict farm groups or representative farms rather than individual farms. However, the measurement of inequality is highly sensitive to the aggregation of individual data. In this paper, redistributive effects of an abolishment of different instruments of the European Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) are analysed with a tool that is able to consistently assess impacts of sectoral policy on individual farm incomes. We find that an abolishment of the main components of the CAP, direct payments and market and price policies, results in a more unequal income distribution in relative terms, but a more equal income distribution in absolute terms. Based on the latter, we conclude that if the CAP aims at a more equal income distrbution within the agricultural sector, then significant scope for improving the design of respective policy instruments exists.

We conduct an incentive-theoretical analysis of political economy considerations in the design of social protection programmes in developing countries to accompany economic reforms. We focus on two aspects of social protection - the provision of redistribution and retraining - that arguably characterize many reform packages. We analyse the interaction of compensatory redistribution and retraining programmes, and demonstrate that the provision of redistributive programmes might distort incentives for individuals to undertake worker retraining. This disincentive effect can be large enough to politically derail the passage of even those reform policies that are expected to increase output and to benefit a majority of the population. Conversely, it may be possible for an economic reform to win political support in the absence of compensatory redistribution. Thus we suggest that a 'political failure' may occur due to the complex interaction between the political and economic incentives created by these programmes.

Tesi per compendi de publicacions ; Investments in major transport infrastructure projects involve a significant mobilisation of economic resources both for construction and operation. In these projects, to assess the efficiency of the resources used, decision-makers usually use cost-benefit analysis (CBA). This key element of welfare economics is carried out taking into account the effects for society as a whole. Social welfare is thus measured independently of who are the components of society receiving the benefits or suffering the costs. However, besides the best use of resources, which should be always ensured, transport projects often have other objectives. These objectives, which are ideally defined by the political programs of elected decision-makers, often involve redistributive effects. Favouring the economic development of less advanced regions is, for instance, an argument that is used to justify territorial biases in investment. Practitioners have increasingly tried to identify redistributive effects to both create awareness of their existence and to quantify them in order to incorporate them rigorously in project appraisal. Intergenerational redistributive effects due to the financial scheme adopted for the project are a kind of redistributive effects that has neither been properly highlighted nor researched until now. The actual payments to cover the costs of projects unfolding over long timespans depend on the financing formula chosen and affect taxpayers and/or users of different generations. When transport investments are directly covered by the annual budgets of public administrations, they are paid by the taxpayers of the construction period but benefit users that will live in decades ahead. However, if the project is financed through loans, their payment schedule will define a very different financial time-profile. Relating the payments profile with the benefits produced by the project, which occur over its life cycle, can indicate the fairness of the distribution of expenditure and benefits across the successive generations affected by the project. At microeconomic level, intergenerational impacts have been discussed, often with insufficient rigor, in relation to environmental sustainability and mostly regarding the appropriate discount rate to be applied in CBA. However, the financial structuring of the project could have a much stronger impact on a project's legacy. The issue of the long-term implications of financial decisions is illustrated, at a broader macroeconomic level, by the problems of public debt confronted by many countries. In this work the redistributive effects of transport investment projects are analysed, though the major contribution is the development of the "Intergenerational Redistributive Effects Model" (IREM). This microeconomic model allows performing an analysis of intergenerational impact for both major project of transport infrastructure and integrated investment programmes that is useful to obtain indicators of their utility for the successive (overlapped) generations concerned. Decision makers and financiers may use the IREM's outputs when proposing a financial montage for a project and deciding the participation of private stakeholders and the contribution of users in it. They also can use the IREM's indicators as insights to establish the most convenient financial montage to carry out a project. In synthesis, what is presented, developed and tested is a tool to characterise the intergenerational impacts from major transport investment. These effects should be included in the wide concept of project sustainability but have, until now, been disregarded in spite of their importance for decision makers and financiers. ; Las inversiones en grandes proyectos de infraestructura de transporte comportan una movilización significativa de recursos económicos. Para analizar si se realiza un uso eficiente de estos recursos, los responsables de la toma de decisiones suelen evaluar la rentabilidad socieconómica de la inversión mediante un análisis coste-beneficio (ACB). Este análisis se lleva a cabo teniendo en cuenta los efectos del proyecto para la sociedad en su conjunto, sin tener en cuenta quiénes reciben los beneficios y quiénes sufren los costos. Sin embargo, las grandes inversiones en proyectos de transporte a menudo persiguen favorecer ciertos grupos sociales, territorios, etc. Estos objetivos, idealmente establecidos en los programas políticos de los responsables de la toma de decisiones, a menudo implican efectos redistributivos. Los efectos redistributivos de carácter social, territorial y medioambiental se han tratado de identificar tanto para crear conciencia de su existencia como con el fin de incorporarlos rigurosamente a la evaluación del proyecto. Sin embargo, los efectos redistributivos de carácter intergeneracional derivados de la fórmula de financiación utilizada para llevar a cabo el proyecto han pasado relativamente desapercibidos hasta ahora. Los pagos que se realizan para sufragar los costos de los proyectos dependen del montaje financiero finalmente empleado. En este sentido, si se recurre a préstamos a muy largo plazo, serán los contribuyentes y/o usuarios de diferentes generaciones quienes terminarán soportando la carga financiera del proyecto. Pero si la inversión principal se sufraga directamente con los presupuestos anuales de las administraciones públicas, la carga financiera recaerá en los contribuyentes del período de construcción mientras usuarios que vivirán en las próximas décadas se benefician de los efectos positivos del proyecto. Relacionar el perfil temporal de pagos y beneficios a lo largo del ciclo de vida del proyecto permite obtener información acerca si existe un cierto equilibrio entre la distribución de la carga financiera y los beneficios que obtienen las generaciones sucesivas afectadas por el proyecto. A nivel microeconómico, se han discutido los impactos intergeneracionales, a menudo con un rigor insuficiente, en relación con la sostenibilidad ambiental y, principalmente, con respecto a la tasa de descuento de aplicación al ACB. Sin embargo, la estructuración financiera del proyecto podría tener un impacto mucho mayor en su legado. El problema de las consecuencias a largo plazo de las decisiones financieras se ilustra, a nivel macroeconómico, por los problemas de la deuda pública que enfrentan muchos países. En este trabajo se analizan y clasifican por primera vez los distintos efectos redistributivos asociados a los grandes proyectos de inversión en infraestructuras de transporte. La mayor contribución de esta tesis es, sin embargo, el desarrollo de una herramienta de análisis denominada "Ingergenerational Redistributive Effects Model¿ (IREM). El modelo ofrece una serie de indicadores estandarizados que son útiles para evaluar la conveniencia de la inversión desde la perspectiva de las sucesivas generaciones involucradas y, además, permite establecer hasta que punto la fórmula de financiación empleada es adecuada o no teniendo en cuenta los potenciales efectos redistributivos intergeneracionales que provoca. En síntesis, esta tesis doctoral presenta, desarrolla y pone en práctica una herramienta que permite caracterizar los impactos intergeneracionales de las principales inversiones en transporte. Estos impactos deberían incluirse en el amplio concepto de sostenibilidad del proyecto, aunque hasta ahora han pasado desapercibidos tanto para los responsables de la toma de decisiones como para los agentes financieros. ; Postprint (published version)