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This paper investigates the effects of policy instruments (entry restrictions, power limits and device robustness requirements) on welfare for two types of wireless networks (with and without backbone relay) through economic modeling. The study finds that (1) robustness requirements are undesirable; (2) the potential welfare improvement associated with power limits increases with the number of firms in the market; (3) when set inadequately, all three policy instruments can cause significant welfare loss; (4) comparison of a prototype property rights regime and a prototype commons regime suggests, given the same power restrictions, the property rights regime tends to outperform the commons regime as long as the number of firms is not significantly smaller (in relative terms) than the optimal number of firms, which itself is a small fraction of the open commons equilibrium number of firms.

Research demonstrates that some government agencies are more accomplished than others when it comes to e-government. More generally, various scholars suggest that e-government is moving forward at a relatively slow pace, especially in relation to the sophistication of government Web sites. With these issues in mind, this research utilized interviews with state public utility commission staff members to explore their agencies' experiences with staffi ng, funding, coordinating, and prioritizing their e-government eff orts, particularly their Web site activities. Assessing such eff orts in both quantitative and qualitative terms, this research found that a mix of various factors, including fi nancial resources, knowledgeable staff , and administrative oversight, related to better performance. Moreover, although public utility commissions have a clear mission to serve both consumers and regulated utilities, this research indicates that the commissions are focusing more of their e-government eff orts on industry rather than citizens.

Purpose -This paper proposes to describe a model and the results of a simulation exercise used to compare welfare outcomes for four governance regimes that might be employed for wireless services: two spectrum ownership regimes and two open commons regimes. Aims also to examine practical implications for policy makers.Design/methodology/approach -A formal economic model was constructed and computational techniques were employed to explore the welfare consequences of alternative applications of policy instruments.Findings -For the model examined, the market does as well as can be expected from government in setting interference tolerance for both types of regimes. However, commons regimes always generate excessive entry. While the theoretical optimum achievable by government in an ownership regime exceeds predicted welfare for a commons regime, for most model specifications the difference is not too large and an ownership regime can easily under-perform a commons regime if imperfectly-informed policy makers set policy variables incorrectly.Research limitations/implications -The necessity of using computational methods limits the generality of the findings.Practical implications -The modeling approach and analysis identify critical tradeoffs that must be addressed by policy makers in designing spectrum governance institutions.Originality/value -This analytical approach makes possible hitherto impossible, side-by-side performance comparisons for alternative governance regimes. The framework can be extended and generalized to other policy issues.