IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ulp/sbbeta/2014-09.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Supra-Regional vs. Regional Regulators in the Water Pollution Mitigation: Optimal Exemption Policies

Author

Listed:
  • François DESTANDAU
  • Anne ROZAN
  • Sandrine SPAETER

Abstract

Through the Water Framework Directive, the European Commission urges its Mem- ber states to reach a level of "good status" of water for 2015. This level can be different from the regional first-best. Neither the supra-regional regulator (European Commission) nor the regional regulator (Member State) knows perfectly this firstbest. Each region can estimate it thanks to a cost-benefit analysis (CBA). If the estimated first-best is lower than the "good status" level, the region can ask to be exempted from reaching the latter. In this paper, we show that regional regulators do not always invest largely in CBA in optimum, although under-investment increases the probability of being urged to reach the highest level of water quality. Besides, the optimal exemption policy announced by the supra-regional regulator, which depends on the CBA's investment, shall also depend on the local risk preferences and environmental vulnerability. If the exemption policy is uniform across the regions, we obtain that more risk averse and/or more environmentally vulnerable populations invest less in the CBA, contrary to the first intuition. Policy implications are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • François DESTANDAU & Anne ROZAN & Sandrine SPAETER, 2014. "Supra-Regional vs. Regional Regulators in the Water Pollution Mitigation: Optimal Exemption Policies," Working Papers of BETA 2014-09, Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée, UDS, Strasbourg.
    • Handle: RePEc:ulp:sbbeta:2014-09
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://beta.u-strasbg.fr/WP/2014/2014-09.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. George J. Stigler, 1971. "The Theory of Economic Regulation," Bell Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 2(1), pages 3-21, Spring.
    2. Brouwer, Roy & Hofkes, Marjan & Linderhof, Vincent, 2008. "General equilibrium modelling of the direct and indirect economic impacts of water quality improvements in the Netherlands at national and river basin scale," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 127-140, May.
    3. Yolande Hiriart & David Martimort, 2012. "How much discretion for risk regulators?," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 43(2), pages 283-314, June.
    4. Hutchinson, Emma & Kennedy, Peter W., 2008. "State enforcement of federal standards: Implications for interstate pollution," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 316-344, August.
    5. Bontems, Philippe & Bourgeon, Jean-Marc, 2005. "Optimal environmental taxation and enforcement policy," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(2), pages 409-435, February.
    6. Nick Hanley & Sergio Colombo & Dugald Tinch & Andrew Black & Ashar Aftab, 2006. "Estimating the benefits of water quality improvements under the Water Framework Directive: are benefits transferable?," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 33(3), pages 391-413, September.
    7. Michel Cavagnac, 2003. "Environmental standard setting by a supra-regional authority: customisation or convergence?," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 30(4), pages 415-437, December.
    8. Krysiak, Frank C. & Schweitzer, Patrick, 2010. "The optimal size of a permit market," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 60(2), pages 133-143, September.
    9. repec:hal:pseose:hal-00813175 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Estache, Antonio & Wren-Lewis, Liam, 2010. "What Anti-Corruption Policy Can Learn from Theories of Sector Regulation," CEPR Discussion Papers 8082, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    3. Scott Gehlbach & Konstantin Sonin & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2010. "Businessman Candidates," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(3), pages 718-736, July.
    4. Häckner, Jonas & Herzing, Mathias, 2017. "The effectiveness of environmental inspections in oligopolistic markets," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 83-97.
    5. Thomas Wyrick & Roger Arnold, 1989. "Earmarking as a deterrent to rent-seeking," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 60(3), pages 283-291, March.
    6. Pavel Ciaian & Ján Pokrivčák & Dušan Drabik, 2008. "Prečo sú niektoré sektory v tranzitívnych ekonomikách menej reformované ako ostatné? prípad výskumu a vzdelávania v oblasti ekonómie [Why some sectors of transition economies are less reformed than," Politická ekonomie, Prague University of Economics and Business, vol. 2008(6), pages 819-836.
    7. Kris James Mitchener & Matthew Jaremski, 2014. "The Evolution of Bank Supervision: Evidence from U.S. States," NBER Working Papers 20603, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Masciandaro, D. & Nieto, M. & Prast, H.M., 2007. "Financial Governance of Banking Supervision," Other publications TiSEM 65d7ff26-dca3-4da3-86ff-6, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. J. Mark Ramseyer & Eric Rasmusen, 2013. "Lowering the Bar to Raise the Bar: Licensing Difficulty and Attorney Quality in Japan," Working Papers 2013-12, Indiana University, Kelley School of Business, Department of Business Economics and Public Policy.
    10. Grant H. Lewis, 2017. "Effects of federal socioeconomic contracting preferences," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 49(4), pages 763-783, December.
    11. Rausser, Gordon C. & de Janvry, Alain & Schmitz, Andrew & Zilberman, David D., 1980. "Principal issues in the evaluation of public research in agriculture," Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley, Working Paper Series qt74v9m7dh, Department of Agricultural & Resource Economics, UC Berkeley.
    12. Arvind Magesan & Matthew A. Turner, 2008. "The Value of Information in Public Decisions," Working Papers tecipa-345, University of Toronto, Department of Economics.
    13. Arblaster, Margaret & Zhang, Chrystal, 2020. "Liberalisation of airport air traffic control: A case study of Spain," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 38-47.
    14. Deniz Igan & Prachi Mishra & Thierry Tressel, 2012. "A Fistful of Dollars: Lobbying and the Financial Crisis," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(1), pages 195-230.
    15. Elert, Niklas & Henrekson, Magnus, 2017. "Entrepreneurship and Institutions: A Bidirectional Relationship," Working Paper Series 1153, Research Institute of Industrial Economics, revised 05 May 2017.
    16. Schnellenbach, Jan & Schubert, Christian, 2015. "Behavioral political economy: A survey," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PB), pages 395-417.
    17. Hahn, Robert & Evans, Lewis, 2010. "Regulating Dynamic Markets: Progress in Theory and Practice," Working Paper Series 4052, Victoria University of Wellington, The New Zealand Institute for the Study of Competition and Regulation.
    18. Sauro Mocetti & Giacomo Roma & Enrico Rubolino, 2022. "Knocking on Parents’ Doors: Regulation and Intergenerational Mobility," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 57(2), pages 525-554.
    19. Koichi Hamada & Asahi Noguchi, 2005. "The Role of Preconceived Ideas in Macroeconomic Policy: Japan's Experiences in the Two Deflationary Periods," Working Papers 908, Economic Growth Center, Yale University.
    20. Fernando Borraz & Juan Dubra & Daniel Ferrés & Leandro Zipitría, 2009. "Supermarket Entry and its effect on small stores in Montevideo, 1998 to 2007," Documentos de trabajo 2009005, Banco Central del Uruguay.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Supra-Regional Regulator; Regional Regulators; Exemption Policy; Imperfect Estimation; Local Préférences.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D8 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty
    • Q25 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Water
    • Q28 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Government Policy

    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:ulp:sbbeta:2014-09. 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: the person in charge The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask the person in charge to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bestrfr.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.