Chapter 10 - Government intervention in the market
market failure - where the free market fails to
achieve an efficient allocation of resources,
Market failure leads to productive and allocative
inefficiency
cases
(de)merit goods
public goods
imperfect info
positive/negative externality
equity issues-poverty, inequality
immobility of factors of production
Cost-Benefit analysis
technique
1. identify all costs and benefits
2. assign a monetary value on each of these(shadow price)
3. adjust the figures for inflation, apply discount
cash flow rate to get the net present value
4. compare the costs and benefits,
criticisms/limitations
shadow pricing is not
accurate, very subjective
if some costs/benefits come later than expected,
the net present value could be changed as the
disount rate remains unchanged
not all affected 3rd parties are included in
cost/benefits , e.g. future generations
distributional pattern not taken into account, through
weightings, e.g. £10m is worth more in the West Midlands than
London
discount factor/inflation
assumptions are subject
to change
large room for deviation
CBA can be
manipulated - optimistic
forecast
government intervention
solutions
government regulation
and legislation
pollution regulation
can limit pollution BUT hard to enforce and monitor AND also
does not generate tax revenue to compensate victims
extend property rights
incentivise conservation of land
tragedy of the commons
use pollution permits
direct provision of goods
e.g. nationalisation
fiscal policies, subsidies, taxes
environmental taxation, e.g. landfill tax,
air passenger duty, fuel duty
distributional problems, those that generate pay less
evaluation:
1. hard to find the value of the negative externality
2.total pollution might not change because of different elasticities of demand for goods
3. taxes need to be high for inelastic demand goods