Since the 1990s, many countries have deregulated their electricity markets. Electricity producers and distributors participate in auctions in forward and spot markets, which determine production allocation and wholesale prices. A key policy question for the United States and the rest of the world is whether financial traders should be allowed to participate in the auctions to arbitrage differences between forward and spot prices. Does arbitrage benefit consumers? Does it lead to more efficient allocation of production resources? This article summarises Ito and Reguant (2016), and address those questions from theoretical and empirical perspectives by examining the Iberian electricity market.
Regulations
Why small isn’t always beautiful: labor regulations and firm growth
Regulations often have unintended costs as well as intended benefits. France has a large number of labor market regulations that bind when a firm has 50 or more employees. These regulations are intended to help workers, but they also act as a tax on large firms. This discourages firms near the threshold from growing larger and producing more output. We calculate that these French labor regulations depress overall economic output by over 3%.
