Bush School Series in the Economics of Public Policy – serie

As the globalization of financial markets continues, we urgently need to understand the crises that have plagued these markets and the policies best suited to preventing such crises in the future. In this book, a prominent group of economists and policymakers blend conceptual analysis and policy discussion in seven well-integrated papers, analyzing the nature of capital flows, alternative exchange-rate regimes, and the roles of international financial institutions. After a guided tour by the editor and an historical exploration, some of the world's leading theorists and policy analysts examine the benefits and pitfalls of capital movements and controls. In the second portion, papers examine the recent experiences of Argentina and Mexico, with Charles Calomiris - whose proposals for a new world financial architecture have elicited wide attention - contributing a response. The volume concludes with a roundtable discussion of the report of the International Financial Institutions Advisory Commission, in which the chair of the commission, Allan H. Meltzer, both comments on the report and responds to questions about it.The material presented here should become a standard reference for analysts, policymakers and the interested general public.

The electricity market has experienced enormous setbacks in delivering on the promise of deregulation. In theory, deregulating the electricity market would increase the efficiency of the industry by producing electricity at lower costs and passing those cost savings on to customers. As Electricity Deregulation shows, successful deregulation is possible, although it is by no means a hands-off process - in fact, it requires a substantial amount of design and regulatory oversight. This collection brings together leading experts from academia, government, and big business to discuss the lessons learned from experiences such as California's market meltdown as well as the ill-conceived policy choices that contributed to those failures. More importantly, the essays that comprise Electricity Deregulation offers a number of innovative prescriptions for the successful design of deregulated electricity markets. Written with economists and professionals associated with each of the network industries in mind, this comprehensive volume provides a timely and astute deliberation on the many risks and rewards of electricity deregulation.