Yardstick Competition to Elicit Private Information: An Empirical Analysis of the Japanese Gas Distribution Industry

This study examines the effect of yardstick regulation in Japan's gas distribution sector, especially focusing on its effect of reducing the adverse selection problem. The Japanese government has regulated the price of city gas supplies by a combination of fixed-price regulation and ex-ante yardstick regulation. The yardstick compares a firm's reported costs wit those of "similar" firms before the price is determined.Realizing that yardstick inspection will lead the industry to a full-information outcome if it works perfectly, we infer its effect from the difference between the current and the counterfactual full-information welfare levels. We estimate the cost function of retail gas distributors under the assumption of asymmetric information between the regulator and the distributor in the efficient level of labor. The estimation allows us to obtain informational parameters such as firms' efficiency levels and effort levels. Using the estimated cost structure and the firms' behavior inresponse to the regulatory incentive, along with the demand system and the behavior of the regulator, we calculate the current and the hypothetical full-information welfare levels, and examine whether the discrepancy of the current level from the full-information one has been significantly reduced since the introduction of yardstick regulation. Our results suggest that, on average, yardstick regulation reduces welfare discrepancy, implying it is somewhat effective in reducing firms' incentive to report higher costs. This effect, however, comes mainly from the very first inspection conducted in 1995. There seems to be a dynamic problem, similar to the Ratchet effect, because subsequent inspections cannot be effective for a firm that has learned the relative position of its own cost in the comparison group.

Vertical Integration in the U.S. Cable Industry

Theory shows that vertical integration has contrasting two effects, efficiency and foreclosure effects. This study empirically estimates the relative size of these two effects. Unlike previous studies, I focus on a single vertical merger in order to use a panel dataset, and estimate its average treatment effects on the several market outcomes. The findings suggest that there was a significant efficiency gain from the merger; the merged systems were found to carry affiliated networks more frequently; there was a larger price decrease in the merged markets. On the other hand, there was weak evidence of foreclosure.

Aging, Probability Weighting, and Reference Point Adoption: An Experimental Study

We examine generational differences in risk-taking behavior by means of a laboratory experiment with monetary incentives. We estimate the parameterized models in the framework of cumulative prospect theory and examine the risk aversion, probability weightings and reference point adoption of elderly and young groups. The results of our experiment indicate that the elderly group is less sensitive to changes in probability and tends to underestimate large probabilities and overestimate small probabilities more strongly than does the young group. Furthermore, we find that the elderly update their reference point after gains and tend to derive their utility from gains and losses not from levels of wealth. In sum, we find that the elderly group's behavior departs more from the traditional expected utility theory than does the young group's behavior.

An Empirical Analysis of Entrant and Incumbent Bidding in Electric Power Procurement Auctions

This paper explores the asymmetry between entrants and incumbents in electric power procurement auctions in Japan. In this market, entrants are considered to have a signi\u85cant disadvantage in production cost structure, while incumbents have high opportunity costs of winning auctions. Using transaction prices, we empirically analyze the bidding patterns and the cost distributions of entrants and incumbents. We employ a structural model where the participation of entrants in an auction is endogenous. We also conduct counterfactual analyses under a price-preference policy to see whether such a policy can enhance competition and the participation of entrants. The results indicate that the cost distribution of incumbents has a higher mean than that for entrants and that the opportunity cost of winning auctions for incumbents is economically signi\u85cant. For the average auction, we \u85nd that price-preferential treat-ment does not have much e¤ect on entrant participation. We also \u85nd that a prefer-ence for the weak bidder (namely, the incumbent) does not improve the governments procurement cost. In fact, government cost is minimized with a small preference for entrants, where the competition e¤ect on the incumbent o¤sets the preference e¤ect on entrants.

日本における水痘疫学動態の再構築：初感染年齢の上昇及びCOVID-19パンデミック前、中、後の疫学動態

京都大学新制・論文博士博士(医学)乙第13512号論医博第2262号新制||医||1061(附属図書館)(主査)教授 川上 浩司, 教授 近藤 尚己, 教授 長尾 美紀学位規則第4条第2項該当Doctor of Medical ScienceKyoto UniversityDFA

The Basket-peg, Dollar-peg and Floating: A Comparative Analysis of Exchange Rate Regimes

currency basket, financial crisis, exchange rate regime, dollar-peg, basket-peg, floating exchange rates, optimal weights