IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mil/wpdepa/2009-16.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Building a bridge across CBA traditions: the contribution of EU Regional Policy

Author

Listed:
  • Massimo FLORIO
  • Silvia VIGNETTI

Abstract

This paper presents the basic principles of the EU approach to cost-benefit analysis (CBA) of infrastructure projects, as embodied in the recently issued CBA Guide for the Structural Funds. After an introduction about the objectives and instruments of the 2007-2013 EU Cohesion Policy, the paper discusses some methodological choices which have been made by the team authoring the EC Guide. Some ‘rules of the game’ (i. e. the use of shadow prices, the calculation of a proper shadow wage, the monetisation of non-market impacts, the choice of a social discount rate and the use of welfare weights) have been proposed in the Guide, in the light of regional differences in market conditions and welfare objectives of the EU regional development policy. The analysis shows that, differently from well-known national traditions of Cba in Europe (an explicit comparison is made with the British “Green Book”) the EU perspective calls for a general CBA framework which is not so different from the project appraisal practice in less developed countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Massimo FLORIO & Silvia VIGNETTI, 2009. "Building a bridge across CBA traditions: the contribution of EU Regional Policy," Departmental Working Papers 2009-16, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
  • Handle: RePEc:mil:wpdepa:2009-16
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://wp.demm.unimi.it/files/wp/2009/DEMM-2009_016wp.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chiara Del Bo & Carlo Fiorio & Massimo Florio, 2011. "Shadow Wages for the EU Regions," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 32(1), pages 109-143, March.
    2. Kögel, Tomas, 2011. "On the Relation between Discounting of Climate Change and Edgeworth-Pareto Substitutability," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 3, pages 1-12.
    3. Massimo Florio, 2006. "Cost-benefit analysis and the European union cohesion fund: On the social cost of capital and labour," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(2), pages 211-224.
    4. Helgeson, Jennifer & Dietz, Simon & Atkinson, Giles D. & Hepburn, Cameron & Sælen, Håkon, 2009. "Siblings, not triplets: social preferences for risk, inequality and time in discounting climate change," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 3, pages 1-28.
    5. Dreze, Jean & Stern, Nicholas, 1987. "The theory of cost-benefit analysis," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 14, pages 909-989, Elsevier.
    6. Nigar HASHIMZADE & Gareth MYLES, 2009. "Cost-benefit analysis and the marginal cost of public funds," Departmental Working Papers 2009-29, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    7. Bev Dahlby, 2008. "The Marginal Cost of Public Funds: Theory and Applications," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262042509, December.
    8. Massimo FLORIO, 2006. "Multi-government cost-benefit analysis: shadow prices and incentives," Departmental Working Papers 2006-37, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    9. Michela Cella & Massimo Florio, 2007. "Hierarchical contracting in grant decisions: ex-ante and ex-post evaluation in the context of the EU Structural Funds," UNIMI - Research Papers in Economics, Business, and Statistics unimi-1059, Universitá degli Studi di Milano.
    10. Sapir, Andre & Aghion, Philippe & Bertola, Giuseppe & Hellwig, Martin & Pisani-Ferry, Jean & Rosati, Dariusz & Vinals, Jose & Wallace, Helen, 2004. "An Agenda for a Growing Europe: The Sapir Report," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199271498.
    11. Andrea MAIRATE & Francesco ANGELINI, 2006. "Cost-benefit analysis and EU cohesion policy," Departmental Working Papers 2006-34, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    12. Michela Cella & Massimo Florio, 2009. "Hierarchical contracting in grant decisions: ex-ante and ex-post evaluation in the context of the EURegional Policy," Working Papers 171, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Jun 2009.
    13. Andrea Mairate & Francesco Angelini, 2007. "Cost–Benefit Analysis and EU Cohesion Policy," Chapters, in: Massimo Florio (ed.), Cost–Benefit Analysis and Incentives in Evaluation, chapter 2, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    14. -, 2009. "The economics of climate change," Sede Subregional de la CEPAL para el Caribe (Estudios e Investigaciones) 38679, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).
    15. David J. EVANS, 2006. "Social discount rates for the European Union," Departmental Working Papers 2006-20, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    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. Ginés Rus & M. Socorro, 2010. "Infrastructure Investment and Incentives with Supranational Funding," Transition Studies Review, Springer;Central Eastern European University Network (CEEUN), vol. 17(3), pages 551-567, September.
    2. Massimo Florio & Silvia Vignetti, 2013. "The use of ex post Cost-Benefit Analysis to assess the long-term effects of Major Infrastructure Projects," Working Papers 201302, CSIL Centre for Industrial Studies.
    3. Echazu Luciana & Nocetti Diego & Smith William T., 2012. "A New Look into the Determinants of the Ecological Discount Rate: Disentangling Social Preferences," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 1-44, April.
    4. Osama Ahmed & Walid Sallam, 2020. "Assessing the Potential of Improving Livelihoods and Creating Sustainable Socio-Economic Circumstances for Rural Communities in Upper Egypt," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(16), pages 1-23, August.
    5. van den Bergh, J.C.J.M. & Botzen, W.J.W., 2015. "Monetary valuation of the social cost of CO2 emissions: A critical survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 33-46.
    6. Stefano Bartolini & Francesco Sarracino, 2021. "Happier and Sustainable. Possibilities for a post-growth society," Department of Economics University of Siena 855, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    7. James E. Anderson & Will Martin, 2011. "Costs of Taxation and Benefits of Public Goods with Multiple Taxes and Goods," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 13(2), pages 289-309, April.
    8. Yohe, Gary W. & Tol, Richard S. J. & Anthoff, David, 2009. "Discounting for Climate Change," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 3, pages 1-22.
    9. Tol, Richard S. J., 2011. "Modified Ramsey Discounting for Climate Change," Papers WP368, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    10. Chiara Del Bo & Carlo Fiorio & Massimo Florio, 2011. "Shadow Wages for the EU Regions," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 32(1), pages 109-143, March.
    11. Fleurbaey, Marc & Zuber, Stéphane, 2015. "Discounting, beyond utilitarianism," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 9, pages 1-52.
    12. Dorian Jullien, 2018. "Under Risk, Over Time, Regarding Other People: Language and Rationality Within Three Dimensions [Face au risque, dans le temps, par rapport aux autres : langage et rationalité dans trois dimensions," Post-Print halshs-01651042, HAL.
    13. Kopp, Robert E. & Mignone, Bryan K., 2012. "The US government's social cost of carbon estimates after their first two years: Pathways for improvement," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 6, pages 1-41.
    14. Stefan Baumgärtner & Alexandra Klein & Denise Thiel & Klara Winkler, 2015. "Ramsey Discounting of Ecosystem Services," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 61(2), pages 273-296, June.
    15. David J. Frame & Cameron J. Hepburn, 2011. "Emerging markets and climate change: Mexican standoff or low-carbon race?," GRI Working Papers 46, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    16. BRECHET, Thierry & THENIE, Julien & ZEIMES, Thibaut & ZUBER, Stéphane, 2010. "The benefits of cooperation under uncertainty: the case of climate change," LIDAM Discussion Papers CORE 2010062, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    17. Kousky, Carolyn & Kopp, Robert E. & Cooke, Roger M., 2011. "Risk premia and the social cost of carbon: A review," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 5, pages 1-24.
    18. Monika Foltyn-Zarychta & Rafał Buła & Krystian Pera, 2021. "Discounting for Energy Transition Policies—Estimation of the Social Discount Rate for Poland," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-21, January.
    19. Cameron Hepburn & Greer Gosnell, 2014. "Evaluating impacts in the distant future: cost–benefit analysis, discounting and the alternatives," Chapters, in: Giles Atkinson & Simon Dietz & Eric Neumayer & Matthew Agarwala (ed.), Handbook of Sustainable Development, chapter 9, pages 140-159, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    20. Santamaría, Marta & Azqueta, Diego, 2015. "Promoting biofuels use in Spain: A cost-benefit analysis," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 1415-1424.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cost-benefit analysis; EU Cohesion Policy; Project appraisal;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D61 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Allocative Efficiency; Cost-Benefit Analysis
    • H43 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Project Evaluation; Social Discount Rate
    • O22 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - Project Analysis
    • R58 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Regional Government Analysis - - - Regional Development Planning and Policy

    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:mil:wpdepa:2009-16. 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: DEMM Working Papers (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/damilit.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.