External benefits of Sydney Ferry services
A recently published report by Mike Smart of Sapere Research Group shows that external benefits of Sydney Ferry services are significantly smaller than the level of subsidy they receive. This report, commissioned by the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal of New South Wales, will inform the current review of ferry fares in Sydney. IPART’s issues paper and the Sapere report can be downloaded here
The findings of this report were the subject of a Sydney Morning Herald article on 13 Feb 2012. Related link
The author explained the context and implications of the work in a radio interview on ABC Sydney. Related link
Evaluation of the Rugby World Cup 2011 - Auckland
This report presents interim findings of the evaluation of the immediate and legacy economic and social impacts in Auckland, as well as a description of the city’s contribution to plan and deliver a major sporting event. The final report is due in April 2012 once long-lead data becomes available and will include a full economic assessment.
Report
Drinking water - cost benefit analysis
This cost benefit analysis seeks to understand the costs and benefits of requiring drinking water supplies serving different sized populations to meet all or part of the New Zealand drinking water Standards 2005, revised 2008.
Report
Jet Fuel Infrastructure at Sydney Airport
Alistair Davey, Senior Managing Economist with Sapere, was engaged by BP Australia Pty ltd to prepare a submission in response to the application for
declaration of the jet fuel supply infrastructure at Sydney airport by the Board of Airline Representatives of Australia (BARRA).
Report
Empirical Characterisation of Iron Ore Trading Strategies
Implicit in bilateral trade data for bulk commodities is information about costs, demand, and trading strategies. This article introduces a method of estimating this information. It is applied to seaborne iron ore trade from 1985 to 1997. The hypothesis that East Asian importers adopted a strategy of equalising FOB prices in order to mitigate the geographic market power of Australian producers while other importers equalised CIF prices provides the best explanation of trade patterns. It is harder to derive firm conclusions about exporter strategies, but perfect competition appears less satisfactory than Cournot trading explanations.
Report
Anatomy of Growth in the Developed World
The developed world is dependent upon an increasingly unreliable strategy of economic growth to avoid a range of social problems. The character of growth in the developed world has become increasingly perverse, being based partly on frustration strategies, in response to the widespread satiation of basic needs. The rise of satiation has been obscured by the focus of economists on output measures, such as GDP. Meanwhile, trade engagement with the developing world – a potential strategy for need-satisfying growth – is hampered by fears of intellectual property arbitrage and agricultural protectionism. Near term, growth could be sustained by overcoming these impediments. Longer term, a transition is required from growth in output to growth in sophistication.
To access this article click here
Review of the Application of Joint and Several Liability to the Building and Construction Sector.
Sapere Research Group and Buddle Findlay were asked by the Department of Building & Housing to review the implications the current liability rule (as it relates to negligent acts) in the building and construction sector. Sapere’s role was to assess the economic arguments for alternative rules in terms of their effect on incentives, efficiency and underlying behaviour. The intention of the work was to assess the merits of alternative legal rules in terms of the Government’s ultimate goal of enhanced accountability in the building and construction sector.
Buddle Findlay and Sapere did not find evidence (either in law or economics) that a change to the current rule of joint and several liability would improve accountability. Rather, other rules for allocating liability look more unpalatable and are only likely to worsen the situation.
Report
Coromandel District’s Aquaculture Industry Plays Significant Role in the Economy.
The report finds that aquaculture contributes $31M in GDP to the Waikato regional economy and employs about 430 full time staff across the region. The Coromandel is currently producing 31,000 tonnes of mussels and 400 tonnes of oysters annually and with the recent announcement by the Government of a new 300 hectare aquaculture zone in the Hauraki Gulf, which also includes new finfish farming opportunities, aquaculture production is set to increase significantly over the coming years with the flow on effect of creating more jobs and more economic growth for the district. By 2025 the report forecasts that the mussel and oyster industry will contribute more than $60M in GDP to the regional economy and create an extra 354 jobs, and the new finfish industry is projected to bring in an additional $34 million in GDP to the local economy.
Report
Behavioural Economics Provides New Insights for Policy Reform
A new field of research called 'behavioural economics' has emerged, which studies the way in which people deviate from rationality and simple self-interest. This paper investigates the implications of behavioural economics for public policy in New Zealand.
This research paper was prepared by Timothy Irwin, with assistance from Richard Tooth, Sally Wyatt, Glenn Boyle, Simon Kemp and Graham
Scott. It was funded by a grant from the New Zealand Law Foundation.
Report
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