Assessing the Effects of a Tobacco Tax Reform on the Industry Price-Setting Strategy

In July 2020, the Executive Power submitted Bill no. 3887-2020 as the first step towards a wide reform of the Brazilian tax system. It will replace the current PIS/COFINS (charged on turnover of companies) by the CBS (a tax on goods and services), which includes a special regime for cigarettes. The novelty is that the specific cigarette tax will be charged on the highest retail price per cigarette brand across the country. This research simulates three scenarios that differ according to the price-setting strategy of the tobacco industry in reaction to the proposed tax reform. In all simulations, the tax reform would result in considerably higher cigarette prices, lower cigarette consumption, higher tax collection, and an implicit minimum price that is far above the current official price floor. Furthermore, the price dispersion and cross-border shopping across states would be reduced because prices and tax burden per brand would tend to be the same across the country due to the dominant price-setting strategy in the cigarette industry.

Managing natural monopolies: interplay of the regulator and telecom companies in India

Learning outcomes The learning outcomes of this paper are as follows: to understand the characteristics of a natural monopoly such as telecommunications sector and impact of “network externality”; to understand the role of a regulator in maintaining a balance between competition and consolidation of telecom sector; to understand the importance of first-mover advantage in telecom sector and coping mechanism of late entrants; to understand different pricing mechanisms of “natural monopolies” that can be adopted to remain profitable; to understand social cost of price floor in telecommunications sector. Case overview/synopsis Indian telecom sector is going through a downturn where most of the private sector telecom service providers have reported huge losses, failed to pay adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues and reported decline in average revenue per user over a period of 3–4 years. Fierce competition in the sector leads to rock bottom calling and data charges. Bharti Airtel benefitted for being the first mover in terms of market share but with entry of JIO in 2016, the service providers have entered a price war. As a result, service providers have requested Mr. R.S. Sharma, Chairman of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) to come up with a floor on calling charges and requested the government for a bailout package. Currently, Mr. R.S. Sharma, Chairman TRAI is facing a dilemma whether to regulate and come up with a floor on calling and data charges or leave the sector for market correction. Mr. Sharma can also recommend to amend the definition of AGR. Telecommunications sector exhibit the characteristics of a natural monopoly where there is a need of a regulator to introduce “competition for the sector” and “competition in the sector.” In India, TRAI is the regulatory body responsible for introducing “competition for the sector” by auction and “competition in the sector” by deregulating calling and data charges, maintaining at least three private and one public service provider, decreasing “switching cost” of the customers, etc. The case deals with the issues of why there is a need of a regulator in natural monopolies, how different chairmen of TRAI have successfully introduced competition “for” and “in” the sector, and how Indian telecom sector went through a downturn? What should TRAI do to maintain competition in the sector? Complexity academic level The case deals with the issue of managing telecommunications sector (a natural monopoly) by a regulator in the context of India. The regulator had successfully introduced “competition in the sector” and “competition for the sector.” This led to sharp increase in subscriber base and decrease in calling and data charges. Presently, fierce competition in the sector has left the service providers cash crunched. The case deals with the dilemma faced by the chairman of the regulatory body in India on whether the regulator should come up with a price floor or market correction. Study level: MBA, Executive MBA. Supplementary materials Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS 10: Public sector management.

Should the State Control Tariffs?

Tariffs or price control has been a controversial subject in recent years. The debate between legal experts and economists is still a hot topic in any discussion. Tariff control regulated in the work creation omnibus law seems to be a topic that must be discussed again regarding this regulation’s urgency. Are specific prices so impressive that the government can intervene in regulating them? This article examines the urgency of rules regarding price controls to create a healthy competitive environment. After conducting a critical literature review, it was analyzed with critical analysis and looking at the objective of competition law was to maximize welfare by protecting competition. The results in this article indicated that the government could only intervene in regulating price-fixing only if companies’ pricing could harm the country’s economy and consumer welfare. The government, therefore, had an interest in regulating the price ceiling. Meanwhile, the price floor, which was believed to be pro-consumer and could promote consumer welfare had no interest and should not have been limited by the government.

Carbon Taxation and the Paris Agreement

The window of opportunity for containing risks of dangerous instability in the global climate system is closing rapidly. The response of the international community is embedded in the 2015 Paris Agreement, signed by 195 parties. Implementing the mitigation pledges parties submitted for the agreement is an important first step, although an additional mechanism to coordinate and scale up mitigation policy at the international level will likely be needed. Carbon taxation, or similar pricing, has a pivotal role, providing across-the-board incentives for reducing emissions and the critical price signal for redirecting investment, but pricing has proved difficult politically. Analytical literature on carbon taxation provides practical guidance on the role of taxation in implementing the Paris Agreement and enhancing its acceptability. Shifting taxes off labor and capital and onto carbon or fossil fuels can produce a “double dividend” by reducing environmental harm and lowering the burden broader taxes impose on the economy. Broader taxes both discourage work effort and investment and promote tax-sheltering behavior (e.g., activity in the informal sector). For various technical and practical reasons, however, it may not make sense to set the carbon tax rate above levels warranted on environmental grounds. The literature emphasizes the general importance of using carbon pricing revenues to benefit the economy, for example, lowering burdensome taxes or funding productive investments. These economic benefits are forgone if instead carbon pricing revenues are given to households in lump-sum dividends. Where higher energy prices are subject to public acceptability constraints, a package of regulations or their fiscal equivalents (known as “feebates”) have an important role in reinforcing carbon pricing. Carbon mitigation can also produce important domestic environmental co-benefits, such as reductions in local air pollution mortality. Unilateral action may be in many countries’ own interests before even counting the global climate benefits. Recent studies have quantified the carbon prices implicit in countries’ Paris mitigation pledges. These implicit prices differ widely across countries with the stringency of pledges and the responsiveness of emissions to pricing, underscoring the potential efficiency gains from some degree of price coordination at the international level. In fact, an international carbon price floor arrangement could be strikingly effective to the extent that it promotes more mitigation in key emerging market economies, such as China and India. The price floor need only cover a handful of large emitters, could be designed equitably with higher requirements for advanced countries, and could be designed flexibly to accommodate different policy approaches at the national level. Domestically, policymakers need to develop comprehensive mitigation strategies, ideally with carbon pricing as the key element. These strategies need to distribute burdens equitably, assist vulnerable groups, and include supporting measures for investment and pricing for broader sources of greenhouse gases.

Puerto Rico's minimum wage: Revisiting a price floor with bite

Revisiting research from the 1990s from Castillo-Freeman and Krueger, I use the synthetic control method of Abadie et al. to estimate the impact of the most recent increase in the federal minimum wage on employment in Puerto Rico. I estimate that the employment/population ratio of various groups in Puerto Rico was significantly lower than that of a data-constructed synthetic Puerto Rico which did not raise its minimum wage. Placebo tests on other donor units, time periods, and population groups suggest that a significant portion of this gap is a result of the minimum wage. Groups with greater exposure to the minimum wage, such as teens and restaurant workers, experienced proportionally greater declines in employment. My results suggest an own-wage elasticity of employment in Puerto Rico of −0.68, higher than estimates from the mainland, which suggests that the employment response to minimum wages may be more dramatic at higher relative minimum wages.

West African cocoa commitments face major tests

Subject West African Cocoa. Significance Having amended a June proposal for a cocoa price floor of 2,600 dollars per metric tonne (mt), Ivory Coast and Ghana are seeking to enforce compliance with a revised plan that instead includes a 400-dollar-per-mt Living Income Differential (LID) to improve cocoa farmers' livelihoods. The LID applies to purchases starting in the 2020/21 season; compared to 2019/20 forward sales at this time last year, current sales for 2020/21 are down by two-thirds. To ensure LID compliance, the two cocoa regulators -- the Ivorian Coffee and Cocoa Board (CCC) and Ghana Cocoa Board (Cocobod) -- have vowed to monitor whether chocolate companies and processors' sustainability programmes can co-exist to mutual benefit. Impacts Both governments will maintain pressure for LID compliance, as they seek to demonstrate efficacy in improving rural livelihoods. The future LID price incentive to farmers may come into conflict with Ivory Coast’s stated goal to limit cocoa production from next year. Third-party certification schemes and in-house sustainability programmes will face pressure to demonstrate equivalent impact to the LID.