IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/applec/v46y2014i5p539-555.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Efficiency and equity in two-part tariffs: the case of residential water rates

Author

Listed:
  • Simon Porcher

Abstract

As first noticed by Coase (1946), a standard result in utility regulation is that efficiency requires two-part tariffs with marginal prices set to marginal costs and fixed fees equal to each customer' s share of fixed costs. Residential water customers in France face marginal prices for water that average about 8% more than marginal costs. Under price elasticity estimates that are consistent with previous results in the literature, efficiency costs represent around 8 million euros of welfare losses for 2008. Even though the impact is fairly small, current price schedules are an important pre-existing distortion which should be considered when evaluating current taxes aimed at addressing external costs. Moreover, efficiency gains from reformed tariffs could be used to fund water assistance programs focused on financially stressed households.

Suggested Citation

  • Simon Porcher, 2014. "Efficiency and equity in two-part tariffs: the case of residential water rates," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(5), pages 539-555, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:applec:v:46:y:2014:i:5:p:539-555
    DOI: 10.1080/00036846.2013.857001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/00036846.2013.857001
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00036846.2013.857001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Garcia, Serge & Reynaud, Arnaud, 2004. "Estimating the benefits of efficient water pricing in France," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 1-25, March.
    2. de Bartolome, Charles A. M., 1995. "Which tax rate do people use: Average or marginal?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 79-96, January.
    3. Lucas W. Davis & Erich Muehlegger, 2010. "Do Americans consume too little natural gas? An empirical test of marginal cost pricing," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 41(4), pages 791-810, December.
    4. Martin S. Feldstein, 1972. "Equity and Efficiency in Public Sector Pricing: The Optimal Two-Part Tariff," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 86(2), pages 175-187.
    5. Diakité, Daouda & Semenov, Aggey & Thomas, Alban, 2009. "A proposal for social pricing of water supply in Côte d'Ivoire," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 258-268, March.
    6. Heckman, James, 2013. "Sample selection bias as a specification error," Applied Econometrics, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), vol. 31(3), pages 129-137.
    7. James E. T. Moncur & Richard L. Pollock, 1988. "Scarcity Rents for Water: A Valuation and Pricing Model," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 64(1), pages 62-72.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Simon Porcher, 2019. "Does Contracting for the Provision of Public Services Decrease Prices? Evidence from French Water Public Services," Working Papers hal-02145863, HAL.
    2. Raphaël Homayoun Boroumand & Stéphane Goutte & Simon Porcher & Thomas Porcher, 2014. "A Conditional Markov Regime Switching Model to Study Margins: Application to the French Fuel Retail Markets," Working Papers hal-01090837, HAL.
    3. Younes Ben Zaied & Nidhaleddine Ben Cheikh & Pascal Nguyen, 2017. "Modeling nonlinear water demand : The case of Tunisia," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 37(2), pages 637-644.
    4. Li, Yao & Fan, Jin & Zhao, Dingtao & Wu, Yanrui & Li, Jun, 2016. "Tiered gasoline pricing: A personal carbon trading perspective," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 194-201.
    5. Farrell, Niall & Meles, Tensay Hadush, 2023. "The equity and efficiency of electricity network tariffs," Papers WP744, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    6. Michael O'Donnell & Robert P. Berrens, 2018. "Understanding Falling Municipal Water Demand in a Small City Dependent on the Declining Ogallala Aquifer: Case Study of Clovis, New Mexico," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 4(04), pages 1-40, October.
    7. Kenneth A. Baerenklau & María Pérez-Urdiales, 2019. "Can Allocation-Based Water Rates Promote Conservation and Increase Welfare? A California Case Study," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 5(02), pages 1-26, April.
    8. Younes Ben Zaied & Marie Estelle Binet, 2015. "Modelling seasonality in residential water demand: the case of Tunisia," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(19), pages 1983-1996, April.
    9. Jayanath Ananda & Nicholas Pawsey & Tahmid Nayeem, 2022. "Customer‐centric regulation: The case of Victorian urban water sector," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 16(2), pages 536-556, April.
    10. Porcher, Simon, 2017. "The ‘hidden costs’ of water provision: New evidence from the relationship between contracting-out and price in French water public services," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 166-175.
    11. Farrell, Niall, 2021. "The increasing cost of ignoring Coase: Inefficient electricity tariffs, welfare loss and welfare-reducing technological change," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    12. Boroumand, Raphaël Homayoun & Goutte, Stéphane & Porcher, Simon & Porcher, Thomas, 2016. "Asymmetric evidence of gasoline price responses in France: A Markov-switching approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 52(PB), pages 467-476.
    13. Elham Erfanian & Alan R. Collins, 2018. "Charges for Water and Access: What Explains the Differences Among West Virginian Municipalities?," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 4(04), pages 1-27, October.
    14. Gong, Chengzhu & Tang, Kai & Zhu, Kejun & Hailu, Atakelty, 2016. "An optimal time-of-use pricing for urban gas: A study with a multi-agent evolutionary game-theoretic perspective," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 163(C), pages 283-294.
    15. Simon Porcher & Alexandros Maziotis & Maria Molinos-Senante, 2017. "The welfare costs of non-marginal water pricing: evidence from the water only companies in England and Wales," Post-Print hal-02145826, HAL.
    16. Farrell, Niall, 2023. "Calculating efficient Distribution use of System (DUoS) charges for Ireland: Indicative tariffs for residential, commercial and industrial consumers," Papers WP743, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    17. Simon Porcher, 2019. "Water Taxes and Consumer Behavior in France," Working Papers hal-02145848, HAL.
    18. Fuente, David, 2019. "The design and evaluation of water tariffs: A systematic review," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    19. Evans, Olaniyi, 2019. "The effects of US-China trade war and Trumponomics," MPRA Paper 93682, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Farrell, Niall & Humes, Harry, 2022. "Diminishing deadweight loss through energy subsidy cost recovery," Papers WP727, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    21. Francisco Silva Pinto & Rui Cunha Marques, 2016. "Tariff Suitability Framework for Water Supply Services," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 30(6), pages 2037-2053, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Fuente, David & Kabubo-Mariara, Jane & Kimuyu, Peter & Mwaura, Mbutu & Whittington, Dale, 2017. "Assessing the Performance of Alternative Water and Sanitation Tariffs: The Case of Nairobi, Kenya," EfD Discussion Paper 17-21, Environment for Development, University of Gothenburg.
    2. Ariel Casarin, 2014. "Regulated price reforms and unregulated substitutes: the case of residential piped gas in Argentina," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 34-56, February.
    3. Henrique Monteiro, 2005. "Water Pricing Models: a survey," Others 0510002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Severin Borenstein & Lucas W. Davis, 2012. "The Equity and Efficiency of Two-Part Tariffs in U.S. Natural Gas Markets," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 55(1), pages 75-128.
    5. Farrell, Niall & Humes, Harry, 2022. "Diminishing deadweight loss through energy subsidy cost recovery," Papers WP727, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    6. Barde, Julia Alexa & Lehmann, Paul, 2013. "Distributional effects of water tariff reforms: An empirical study for Lima, Peru," UFZ Discussion Papers 14/2013, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ), Division of Social Sciences (ÖKUS).
    7. SaÄŸlam, YiÄŸit, 2011. "Optimal Pricing of Water: Optimal Departures from the Inverse Elasticity Rule," Working Paper Series 1533, Victoria University of Wellington, School of Economics and Finance.
    8. Garcia, Serge & Moreaux, Michel & Reynaud, Arnaud, 2007. "Measuring economies of vertical integration in network industries: An application to the water sector," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 791-820, August.
    9. Simon Porcher & Alexandros Maziotis & Maria Molinos-Senante, 2017. "The welfare costs of non-marginal water pricing: evidence from the water only companies in England and Wales," Post-Print hal-02145826, HAL.
    10. Simon Porcher, 2019. "Water Taxes and Consumer Behavior in France," Working Papers hal-02145848, HAL.
    11. Jan D. Vlasblom & P. P. Gijsel & J. Siegers, 1996. "Labour Supply and Wages of Married and Cohabiting Women in the Federal Republic of Germany and the Netherlands: a Decomposition Analysis," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 132, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    12. Alla Fridman, 2015. "Water pricing reform analysis: alternative scenarios," Journal of Economic Policy Reform, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(3), pages 258-266, September.
    13. Fuente, David, 2019. "The design and evaluation of water tariffs: A systematic review," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    14. Henrique Monteiro, 2010. "Residential Water Demand in Portugal: checking for efficiency-based justifications for increasing block tariffs," Working Papers Series 1 ercwp0110, ISCTE-IUL, Business Research Unit (BRU-IUL).
    15. María Á. García-Valiñas & Roberto Martínez-Espiñeira & Marta Suárez-Varela Maciá, 2021. "Price and Consumption Misperception Profiles: The Role of Information in the Residential Water Sector," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 80(4), pages 821-857, December.
    16. Pérez-Urdiales, María & Libra, Jesse M. & Machado, Kleber B. & Serebrisky, Tomás & Sosa, Ben Solís, 2024. "Household water bill perception in Brazil," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    17. Zhisong Chen & Keith C.K. Cheung & Manyi Tan, 2019. "Inter-Basin Water Transfer Supply Chain Coordination with Ramsey Pricing," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(19), pages 1-22, September.
    18. Marta Suárez-Varela & Ariel Dinar, 2020. "The Role of Curtailment Versus Efficiency on Spillovers Among Pro-Environmental Behaviors: Evidence from Two Towns in Granada, Spain," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(3), pages 1-24, January.
    19. Kertous, Mourad & Zerzour, Sahad, 2015. "To pay or not to pay? Water bill and delay in payment in Bejaia (Algeria): A duration analysis," MPRA Paper 67801, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Andres Gomez-Lobo, 1996. "The welfare consequences of tariff rebalancing in the domestic gas market," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 17(4), pages 49-65, November.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:applec:v:46:y:2014:i:5:p:539-555. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RAEC20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.