IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ces/ceswps/_1123.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Privatization in Austria: Some Theoretical Reasons and First Results About the Privatization Proceeds

Author

Listed:
  • Ansgar Belke
  • Friedrich Schneider

Abstract

The issues of privatization (and sometimes deregulation) have been reviewed in a large literature on the various aspects of privatization, that has emphasized the potential efficiency gains. Hence, the goal of this paper is twofold: First to provide some theoretical reasoning why privatization is useful as well as profitable for an economy and second to empirically present the extent of privatization in Austria and other European Union countries. Therefore, the reasons why privatization is necessary are elaborated. Then the specific pattern privatization proceeds for Austria relative to other EU and OECD countries is presented. Moreover, some important idiosyncratic extensions for the Austrian case are elaborated. We argue that in the Austrian case, any discussion of privatization cannot be reduced to observing cash flows, the employment performance and the stock-exchange ratings of the privatized formerly stateowned enterprises. Since polito-economic aspects relating to income distribution and ideology play an important role in explaining the way, the extent, the speed and the economic effects of privatization, they have to be considered as well.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Ansgar Belke & Friedrich Schneider, 2004. "Privatization in Austria: Some Theoretical Reasons and First Results About the Privatization Proceeds," CESifo Working Paper Series 1123, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1123
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp1123.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Karl Aiginger, 1999. "The Privatisation Experiment in Austria," Austrian Economic Quarterly, WIFO, vol. 4(4), pages 261-270, October.
    2. Wendy Carlin & Steven Fries & Mark Schaffer & Paul Seabright, 2001. "Competition and Enterprise Performance in Transition Economies from a Cross-Country Survey," CERT Discussion Papers 0101, Centre for Economic Reform and Transformation, Heriot Watt University.
    3. Ansgar Belke & Rainer Fehn & Neil Foster, 2001. "Venture Capital Investment and Labor Market Performance: A Panel Data Analysis," Diskussionspapiere aus dem Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre der Universität Hohenheim 197/2001, Department of Economics, University of Hohenheim, Germany.
    4. Boardman, Anthony E & Vining, Aidan R, 1989. "Ownership and Performance in Competitive Environments: A Comparison of the Performance of Private, Mixed, and State-Owned Enterprises," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(1), pages 1-33, April.
    5. Hochreiter, Eduard & Winckler, Georg, 1995. "The advantages of tying Austria's hands: The success of the hard currency strategy," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 11(1), pages 83-111, March.
    6. Klaus Gugler, 1998. "Corporate Ownership Structure in Austria," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 25(3), pages 285-307, January.
    7. Grossman, Sanford J & Hart, Oliver D, 1983. "An Analysis of the Principal-Agent Problem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(1), pages 7-45, January.
    8. Bartel, Rainer & Schneider, Friedrich, 1991. "The "Mess" of the Public Industrial Production in Austria: A Typical Case of Public Sector Inefficiency?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 68(1-3), pages 17-40, January.
    9. Venilde Jeronimo & Jose A. Pagan & Gokce Soydemir, 2000. "Privatization and European Economic and Monetary Union," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 26(3), pages 321-333, Summer.
    10. Carlin, Wendy & Fries, Steven & Schaffer, Mark & Seabright, Paul, 2001. "Competition and Enterprise Performance in Transition Economies: Evidence from a Cross-country Survey," CEPR Discussion Papers 2840, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    11. Niskanen, William A, 1975. "Bureaucrats and Politicians," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 18(3), pages 617-643, December.
    12. Belke, Ansgar, 2000. "Partisan Political Business Cycles in the German Labour Market? Empirical Tests in the Light of the Lucas-Critique," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 104(3-4), pages 225-283, September.
    13. Wolfgang Aussenegg, 2000. "Privatization versus Private Sector Initial Public Offerings in Poland," Multinational Finance Journal, Multinational Finance Journal, vol. 4(1-2), pages 69-99, March-Jun.
    14. Jones, Steven L. & Megginson, William L. & Nash, Robert C. & Netter, Jeffry M., 1999. "Share issue privatizations as financial means to political and economic ends," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 217-253, August.
    15. Maria K. Boutchkova & William L. Megginson, 2000. "Privatization and the Rise of Global Capital Markets," Financial Management, Financial Management Association, vol. 29(4), Winter.
    16. Mr. Jeffrey M. Davis & Mr. Thomas J Richardson & Mr. Rolando Ossowski & Mr. Steven A Barnett, 2000. "Fiscal and Macroeconomic Impact of Privatization," IMF Occasional Papers 2000/010, International Monetary Fund.
    17. William D. Nordhaus, 1975. "The Political Business Cycle," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 42(2), pages 169-190.
    18. Bruno Biais & Enrico Perotti, 2002. "Machiavellian Privatization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 240-258, March.
    19. Perotti, Enrico C, 1995. "Credible Privatization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(4), pages 847-859, September.
    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. Belke, Ansgar & Gros, Daniel, 2009. "Is a unified macroeconomic policy necessarily better for a common currency area?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 98-101, March.
    2. Andreff, Wladimir, 2013. "Une transition économique inattendue : vers le « cupidalisme » ?," Revue de la Régulation - Capitalisme, institutions, pouvoirs, Association Recherche et Régulation, vol. 14.
    3. Woojin Kim & Michael Weisbach, 2005. "Do Firms Go Public to Raise Capital?," NBER Working Papers 11197, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Kim, Woojin & Weisbach, Michael S., 2008. "Motivations for public equity offers: An international perspective," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 281-307, February.
    5. repec:ces:ifodic:v:3:y:2005:i:1:p:14567530 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Ansgar Belke & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "Privatisation in Austria: Response to Internal and External Pressures," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 3(01), pages 26-32, April.
    7. Ansgar Belke & Lars Wang, 2005. "The Costs and Benefits of Monetary Integration Reconsidered: How to Measure Economic Openness," Diskussionspapiere aus dem Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre der Universität Hohenheim 262/2005, Department of Economics, University of Hohenheim, Germany.
    8. Ansgar Belke & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "Privatisation in Austria: Response to Internal and External Pressures," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 3(1), pages 26-32, 04.
    9. Friedrich Schneider & Ansgar Belke, 2004. "Privatization in Austria: Some theoretical reasons and performance measures," Economics working papers 2004-04, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.

    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. Friedrich Schneider & Ansgar Belke, 2004. "Privatization in Austria: Some theoretical reasons and performance measures," Economics working papers 2004-04, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    2. Ansgar Belke & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "Privatisation in Austria: Response to Internal and External Pressures," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 3(1), pages 26-32, 04.
    3. repec:ces:ifodic:v:3:y:2005:i:1:p:14567530 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Borisova, Ginka & Cowan, Arnold R., 2014. "Government asset sales, economic nationalism, and acquirer wealth effects," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 351-368.
    5. Ansgar Belke & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "Privatisation in Austria: Response to Internal and External Pressures," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 3(01), pages 26-32, April.
    6. Bortolotti, Bernardo & Fantini, Marcella & Siniscalco, Domenico, 2004. "Privatisation around the world: evidence from panel data," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(1-2), pages 305-332, January.
    7. Ben-Nasr, Hamdi, 2016. "Labor protection and government control: Evidence from privatized firms," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 52(PB), pages 485-498.
    8. Claude Laurin & Anthony E. Boardman & Aidan R. Vining, 2004. "Government Underpricing of Share‐Issue Privatizations," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(3), pages 399-429, September.
    9. Feng, Fang & Sun, Qian & Tong, Wilson H. S., 2004. "Do government-linked companies underperform?," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(10), pages 2461-2492, October.
    10. Ansgar Belke & Frank Baumgärtner & Friedrich Schneider & Ralph Setzer, 2005. "The Different Extent of Privatisation Proceeds in EU Countries: A Preliminary Explanation Using a Public Choice Approach," CESifo Working Paper Series 1600, CESifo.
    11. Saffar, Walid, 2014. "The political economy of share issue privatization: International evidence," Journal of Multinational Financial Management, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 1-18.
    12. Guedhami, Omrane & Pittman, Jeffrey A. & Saffar, Walid, 2009. "Auditor choice in privatized firms: Empirical evidence on the role of state and foreign owners," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(2-3), pages 151-171, December.
    13. Goyal, Abhinav & Jategaonkar, Shrikant P. & Muckley, Cal B., 2020. "Why do privatized firms pay higher dividends?," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    14. Narjess Boubakri & Jean‐Claude Cosset & Houcem Smaoui, 2009. "Does Privatization Foster Changes In The Quality Of Legal Institutions?," Journal of Financial Research, Southern Finance Association;Southwestern Finance Association, vol. 32(2), pages 169-197, June.
    15. Carla Vieira & Ana Paula Serra, 2006. "Abnormal Returns in Privatization Public Offerings: The case of Portuguese firms," Notas Económicas, Faculty of Economics, University of Coimbra, issue 23, pages 6-34, June.
    16. Hamdi Ben‐Nasr & Narjess Boubakri & Jean‐Claude Cosset, 2012. "The Political Determinants of the Cost of Equity: Evidence from Newly Privatized Firms," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(3), pages 605-646, June.
    17. Seung‐Doo Choi & Inmoo Lee & William Megginson, 2010. "Do Privatization IPOs Outperform in the Long Run?," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 39(1), pages 153-185, March.
    18. Enrico C. Perotti & Luc Laeven & Pieter van Oijen, 2000. "Confidence Building in Emerging Stock Markets," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 366, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.
    19. Germà Bel, 2010. "Against the mainstream: Nazi privatization in 1930s Germany1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 63(1), pages 34-55, February.
    20. Marco Pagano & Paolo Volpin, 2001. "The Political Economy of Finance," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 17(4), pages 502-519.
    21. Bernardo Bortolotti & Marcella Fantini & Carlo Scarpa, 2000. "Why Do Governments Sell Privatised Companies Abroad?," William Davidson Institute Working Papers Series 293, William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Austria; partisan approach; privatization; state-owned enterprises; public choice;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:ces:ceswps:_1123. 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: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    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.