Gema Carrera-Gómez

Cost-Benefit Analysis of Investment in High-Speed Train System in Spain

This study compares the results of two political approaches to transport directed at the reduction of negative external effects. The comparison is between a policy of building a high-speed rail line to attract travelers away from highways and full social-cost pricing on all modes, that is, removing the implicit subsidies to all modes by pricing congestion and external costs. The former approach was adopted in 1992 in Spain with the introduction of the high-speed train in the Madrid-Seville corridor, bringing with it an important increase in the modal share of railway transport. From the analysis made, it can be concluded that from the point of view of economic efficiency and social benefit optimization, the high-speed train should not have been implemented that year (1992) in the Madrid-Seville corridor. Other transport policy approaches, such as the introduction of an optimal modal price based on the respective marginal social costs, would have increased social benefit. Therefore, the results obtained in...

Efficiency Stochastic Frontiers: a Panel Data Analysis for Spanish Airports (1992–1994)

The most efficient airports are the ones of Madrid, Barcelona, Palma de Mallorca, Malaga, Gran Canaria, Tenerife South, Alicante, Ibiza, Fuerteventura, Menorca and Bilbao.

Economic Impact of Santander Airport

In three previous works by Coto-Millan and Villaverde-Castro (1995, 1996) and (2001) research on the port of Santander was carried out in a similar way to the present study. Here we have followed the methodology used in the last work, considering it to be the most suitable for the case of Santander, and the most appropriate methodology today. The category of “agreed methodology” is mainly based upon the wide range of studies (we have reference of over two hundred studies) which employ it, and upon its use by the majority of the Spanish airports, a fact which, saving the logical differences, will allow us to make comparisons between them. The data employed in this research refers to 1998 because the last information obtained from the surveys of different partnerships and the Register of Company Reports, belongs to this period.

Price and Income Elasticities for Intercity Public Transport in Spain

The previous models, based on the conventional demand theory, provide us with empirical evidence for road, railway and air transport in Spain from 1980 to 1988. We obtain the Marshallian demand functions with respect to relevant income and price variables for each modes of transport analyzed. In this work we offer income and price elasticities estimations as well as exchange of data aggregated to interurban passengers transport in Spain. It is necessary to be cautious when interpreting data, due to the high variable aggregation. Some research could be made in the future on this type of model from the desagregation of transport service demand into different lines.

Scale Economies, Elasticities of Substitution and Behaviour of the Railway Transport Costs in Spain

In this paper, we have studied the behaviour of state company RENFE costs from 1964 to 1992. Translog function with the restriction of grade-one homogeneity in the factor prices, has been analized and acceptable results have been obtained for the vehicles-km output. The cost function estimated has an good behaviour since it meets the conditions of monotonicity, quasi concavity and grade-one homogeneity in the factor prices.

Positive Theory of Regulation: an Application to Spanish Foreign Trade

Regulation theory has attracted a great deal of interest in economic literature during the last three decades. One aspect that has been given most attention is the question of whether regulatory measures may be influenced by the action of pressure groups. Recent empirical work on determinants of inter-industry structure of tariffs seems to support the view that some industry characteristics may influence the ability of protection-minded industries to exert pressure in order to get protection. Although it is possible to find increasing amounts of literature concerning this subject in Canada and USA, empirical work studying this issue for Europe is still scarce.

An air traffic demand forecasting model applied to Santander airport

The main contribution of this study is its use of the Box-Jenkins method to estimate passenger demand models for two different demand segments: business travel and leisure travel. This research presents an air traffic forecasting model based on an arima model. Firstly, we offer the intervention model for Easter, the number of working days and the impact of the iberia strike. Then we analyze day of week impact and carry out the forecasting. jel Classification: C53, L93, R41.

Free to choose. A different answer to a known puzzle

Nalebuff (Journal of Economic Perspectives, 1(2), 157–63, 1987) proposes a puzzle and a standard solution to the mentioned puzzle based on Bayes theorem. After giving the standard solution to this problem, Professor Nalebuff asked: ‘Since many if not most individuals choose to stay with their original choice, does this suggest we should look for alternatives to Bayes rule?’ In this paper a right answer to that question is proportionated.

The Measurement of Intra-industry Trade and Specialisation: a Review

The assessment of the relevance of the new theories of trade as opposed to the traditional theoretical approach, when it comes to explain real trade patterns, is essentially an empirical question. Nevertheless, there are two problems (which remain unsolved) which influence the results obtained when measuring intraindustry trade and specialisation. The first problem refers to the very existence of the phenomenon and is related to the definition of “industry” and the selection of the level of data dissagregation more appropriate to study such a phenomenon. The second problem, closely connected to the former, comes from the objective difficulty of finding a convenient quantitative measure.

The Determinants of Intra-industry Trade in Spanish Manufacturing Sectors: a Cross-section Analysis

A wide range of studies devoted to recent evolution of international trade highlights the fact that a significant and increasing proportion of flows consists of bi-directional change of products belonging to the same industry. This phenomenon is known as intra-industry trade.