The political economy of reform: lessons from pensions, product markets and labour markets in ten OECD countries

✍ Scribed by William Tompson, Robert Price

• Publisher: OECD Publishing
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 501
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This report examines why some policy reforms get implemented and others languish by examining 20 structural reform efforts in 10 OECD countries over the past two decades. The case studies cover a wide variety of reform attempts in three key areas: pensions, labour- and product-market regulation. Key factors in the political, economic and reform-specific arenas are identified as helping or hindering reform, and these findings are cross-checked using a relatively simple set of Spearman rank correlations. The reports two-pronged analytical approach quantitative and qualitative results in unique insights for policy makers designing, adopting and implementing structural policy reforms.Table of Content :Executive SummaryPart I. Structural Policy Reform: Learning from the Past/STRONG Chapter 1. Introduction: Why past can be prologue-Annex 1.A1. Statistical methods and data sourcesChapter 2. Key determinants of successful structural reformPart II. Case Studies in Pension-System ReformSTRONGChapter 3. France: The 2003 pension reform Chapter 4. Italy: The 1994 pension reform proposalsChapter 5. Mexico: The reform of the federal employees' pension system, 2001-07Chapter 6. Poland: Reform of the general pension system, 1996-99Chapter 7. Poland: Reform of the farmers'social security system, 2003-05Chapter 8. United States: The 2005 Social Security reform debatePart III. Case Studies in Labour Market ReformChapter 9. France: the contrat d'insertion professionelle, 1994Chapter 10. Germany: The Hartz reforms of the labour market, 2002-05Chapter 11. Italy: The Treu (1997) and Biagi (2002) reforms Chapter 12. Mexico: Labour law reform 2001-03Chapter 13. The Netherlands: Reform of disability insurance, 2002-06Chapter 14. Spain: Labour market reform 1994 and 1997Chapter 15. Sweden: Sickness insurance, 1990-2002Chapter 16. United States: The 1996 welfare reformSTRONGPart IV. Case Studies in Product-Market ReformBRChapter 17. Australia: Power-sector reform 1990-2004Chapter 18. Australia: Water reform, 1004-2004Chapter 19. Germany: Retail opening hours 1999-2004.Chapter 20. The Netherlands: Rent deregulation 2004-07Chapter 21. Spain: Retail entry and opening hours, 1995-2004 Chapter 22. Sweden: Postal liberalisation, 1992-99