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Privatization, Labor and Social Safety Nets
Author(s) -
Gupta Sanjeev,
Schiller Christian,
Ma Henry,
Tiongson Erwin R.
Publication year - 2001
Publication title -
journal of economic surveys
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.657
H-Index - 92
eISSN - 1467-6419
pISSN - 0950-0804
DOI - 10.1111/1467-6419.00152
Subject(s) - economics , revenue , government (linguistics) , common value auction , wage , labour economics , empirical evidence , job creation , public economics , microeconomics , finance , linguistics , philosophy , epistemology
Privatization promotes economic efficiency and growth, thereby reinforcing macroeconomic adjustment. In the short run, however, it can lead to job losses and wage cuts for workers. This paper discusses these adverse impacts of privatization in terms of various methods of privatization and surveys the existing empirical evidence. It finds that public sales and auctions can have stronger negative effects on workers but maximize the government’s revenue. Policymakers’ options for mitigating the social impact of privatization are surveyed.