The Effect of Regulatory Reform on Employment and Earnings in the U.S. Electricity Sector

Niederjohn, M. Scott

doi:10.1016/j.tej.2004.04.005

Cited by 5 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 8 publications

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“…Niederjohn (2003) reports that employment in electricity generation dropped by 29% in states that underwent restructuring, compared to a 19% overall decrease in the sector's employment. As a group, generators in states that have retained the traditional regulatory structure have seen smaller efficiency gains than generators in restructured states (Wolfram 2005;Fabrizio, Rose and Wolfram 2007).…”

Section: E Lectric Restructuring Production E Fficiency and Retail mentioning

confidence: 99%

Electricity Prices and Costs Under Regulation and Restructuring

2008

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Restructuring of the electricity industry was expected to improve the operating efficiency of electric power generators, leading to lower production costs and retail prices. Most studies conclude that there have been some efficiency gains, but the subject of whether retail prices have fallen has been contentious. The existing literature has a number of shortcomings, including the use of blunt or inappropriate definitions of restructuring, failure to incorporate the effects of regulatory decisions regarding price caps and stranded cost recovery, and the use of highly aggregated data. Our study addresses many of these problems and thus represents a significant improvement on existing work. We use a detailed firm-level data set to estimate how the markets and institutions established as a part of "restructuring" have affected the difference between prices and costs. Based on a number of different definitions, we find that utilities that have undergone restructuring display significantly higher price-cost markups than utilities that remained traditionally regulated. We find that some elements of restructuring are associated with higher price-cost margins, while others appear to be uncorrelated with prices and costs. The combination of introducing retail competition into an electric utility's operating territory and divestiture of that utility's generating assets has increased costs, but has increased prices even more. In particular, we find an average difference of 2 to 3 cents per kWh between prices and costs that is explained by restructuring rather than by increases in fuel prices. We conclude that restructuring has been beneficial to companies that restructured, but the evidence is far less clear concerning benefits to consumers.

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Section: E Lectric Restructuring Production E Fficiency and Retail mentioning

confidence: 99%

Electricity Prices and Costs Under Regulation and Restructuring

2008

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“…Aggregate statistics and our interviews with power plant managers both suggest that labor policies in electricity generation have been undergoing a dramatic transformation over the last [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20] years. This transformation has coincided with the rise of non-utility power producers, the privatization of publicly owned utilities outside of the U.S., and the advent of regulatory restructuring.…”

Section: Human Resource Policiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…According to managers at some plants, wage levels have in many cases risen as the number of employees has been reduced and responsibilities expanded. 12 Promotion policies have also become less rigid. One operator at Plant F in England rose to his position in just over two years, much faster than would have been possible under the plant's previous tenure-based promotion scheme.…”

Section: Human Resource Policiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Guy at the Controls: Labor Quality and Power Plant Efficiency

Bushnell

Wolfram

2007

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This paper examines the impact of individual human operators on the fuel efficiency of power plants. Although electricity generation is a fuel and capital intensive enterprise, anecdotal evidence, interviews, and empirical analysis support the hypothesis that labor, particularly power plant operators, can have a non-trivial impact on the operating efficiency of the plant. We present evidence to demonstrate these effects and survey the policies and practices of electricity producing firms that either reduce or exacerbate fuel efficiency differences across individual plant operators.

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“…Narayan and Smyth [32] examined the relationship between electricity consumption, employment and real income in Australia and found that per capita GDP and employment have a positive impact on per capita electricity consumption. In addition to the study of Gurgul and Lach [31] and Narayan and Smyth [32], many researchers [33][34][35] also confirmed that the variable of the employment is also an important factor to affect energy consumption. The variable of residential space is also found to have a positive influence on per capita consumption.…”

Section: The Factors Affecting Residential Electricity Consumption Bamentioning

confidence: 90%

The Factors Affecting Electricity Consumption and the Consumption Characteristics in the Residential Sector—A Case Example of Taiwan

Chen

2017

Sustainability

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This article attempts to examine the factors affecting residential electricity consumption through two approaches, a socioeconomic perspective and a direct use perspective. The results of this study find that gross domestic product (GDP), employment rates, residential space, and the implementation of energy labeling schemes provide significant impacts on residential electricity consumption. However, the impacts of electricity price and the energy efficiency standards do not receive significant support. The analysis of the direct use approach finds that air conditioners consume the largest portion of electricity, amounting to 1470 kWh for each household and accounting for 26.81% except for lighting. Refrigerators and rice cookers follow, consuming 815.83 kWh (14.88%) and 343.85 kWh (6.27%) of electricity. The correlation analysis reveals that GDP keeps a high relationship with the installation of electrical appliances and eventually leads to an increase in residential electricity consumption. By integrating the results obtained from these two approaches, this paper also discusses some improvement strategies. The results, derived from the case example of Taiwan's residential electricity consumption, may provide valuable information for policy-making involving green labeling, energy standards, and electricity prices.

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The Effect of Regulatory Reform on Employment and Earnings in the U.S. Electricity Sector

Cited by 5 publications

References 8 publications

Electricity Prices and Costs Under Regulation and Restructuring

Electricity Prices and Costs Under Regulation and Restructuring

The Guy at the Controls: Labor Quality and Power Plant Efficiency

The Factors Affecting Electricity Consumption and the Consumption Characteristics in the Residential Sector—A Case Example of Taiwan

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