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"Private utilities are no more efficient than public utilities": six questions to Astrid Cullmann

Interview of May 20, 2016

Ms. Cullmann, in recent years many communities have been reacquiring previously privatized shares in energy companies. Does this point to a trend toward remunicipalization?

We have created a new microdata set of German energy companies in order to analyze this question for the first time in Germany. Our empirical analysis shows that both the number as well as the turnover of public companies in the energy supply has indeed increased. But we also compared these changes to the development of private enterprises within this sector, and our results show that there really is no strong trend toward remunicipalization. [...]

The interview with Astrid Cullmann, is published in DIW Economic Bulletin 20/2016 (PDF, 117.15 KB)

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