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Creative industries are increasingly understood to contribute to localised innovation and dynamism. This paper provides a methodologically consistent comparison of creative industries across France, Great Britain, Italy and Spain. We map spatial agglomerations of creative activities showing evidence of urban concentration, which for Britain and France coincides with the dominance of capital cities, whilst for Spain and Italy, significant concentrations can also be found in secondary cities. The four countries also differ in the specialisation profiles and in the role played by policy makers. A lack of dove-tailing with the European Union smart agenda is argued to be a cause of concern. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mainstream economic theory outlines four main causes of market failure and it is already well established that two of these (information failure and externalities) exist in a tobacco market. A third cause of market failure, market power, is also a serious problem in many tobacco markets. Market power--combined with unintended and often overlooked consequences of tobacco tax policies, notably that gradual increases in specific taxes may allow the industry to disguise significant price increases--has, at least in high income countries, given cigarette manufacturers considerable pricing power and profits. This paper examines ways this market failure could be addressed and proposes as a solution a system of price cap regulation wherein a cap is placed on the pre-tax cigarette manufacturers' price but not on the retail price that consumers face. Well established in the utilities industry, price cap regulation would set a maximum price that cigarette companies can charge for their product based on an assessment of the genuine costs each firm faces in its operations and an assumption about the efficiency savings it would be expected to make. Such a system would achieve three main benefits. First, it would address the problem of market failure and excess profits while simultaneously allowing current tobacco control policies, including tax and price increases, to expand--thus tax increases would remain a central tenet of tobacco control policies and retail prices could continue to increase. Second, it would increase government revenue by transferring the excess profits from the industry to the government purse. Third, it would bring numerous public health benefits. In addition to addressing market power, while simultaneously allowing tobacco control policies to expand, it could offer a means of preventing downtrading to cheaper products and controlling unwanted industry practices such as cigarette smuggling, price fixing and marketing to the young. The paper outlines in some detail how such a system might be developed in the UK, while briefly exploring how it could be applied elsewhere, including in markets with state monopolies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The opening of the Thai tobacco market, following action brought by the US Trade Representative under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, is seen as a key case study of the tensions between trade and health policy. Interpretations of the dispute cast it, either as an example of how trade agreements undermine national policy-making, or how governments can adopt effective public health protections compliant with international trade rules. As a UK-based company, British American Tobacco has been regarded as peripheral to this dispute. This paper argues that its close monitoring of the illegal trade during this period, the role of smuggling in the company's global business strategy, and its management of the relative supply and pricing of legal and illegal products after market opening provide a fuller understanding of the interests and roles of transnational tobacco companies and the government in this dispute. The findings have important policy implications, notably the role of effective governance in countries facing pressure to open their tobacco sectors, need to better understand corporate-level activities within an increasingly globalised tobacco industry, and need to address the intertwined legal and illegal trade in implementing the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines whether receipt of a Regional Selective Assistance (RSA) grant has a causal impact on plant total factor productivity (TFP). To tackle the problem of self-selection into the treatment group, propensity score matching is employed. In order to control for the endogeneity of other variables in the model, estimations are performed using the system GMM estimator. The results show that for low technology manufacturing, receipt of an RSA grant leads to a fall in TFP. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Objective A system of price-cap regulation has previously been suggested to address the market failure inherent to the tobacco industry. This would benefit public health directly (eg, by making it extremely difficult for the industry to sell cut-price cigarettes, or use price as a marketing strategy) and indirectly (eg, by reducing the available money the industry has for spending on marketing and lobbying). This paper explores the feasibility of applying such a scheme in the UK. Methods The impact of price-capping is modelled using optimistic and conservative scenarios, each with different assumptions, and using 2009 and 2010 profit data for the major companies selling tobacco in the UK. The models are used to calculate by how much would profit be reduced through the imposition of price caps, and thus, how much revenue could be raised in additional taxes, assuming the end price the consumer pays does not change. Results Tobacco companies enjoy massive profit margins, up to 67%, in the UK. The optimistic scenario suggests a potential increase in UK tobacco tax revenue of £585.7 million in 2010 (£548.4 million in 2009), while the conservative model suggests an increase in revenue of £433.6 million in 2010 (£399.2 million in 2009). This would be approximately enough to fund, twice over, UK-wide antitobacco smuggling measures, and smoking cessation services in England, including the associated pharmacotherapies, to help people stop smoking. Conclusions Applying a system of price-cap regulation in the UK would raise around £500 million per annum (US$750 million). This is likely to be an underestimate because of cautious assumptions used in the model. These significant financial benefits, in addition to the public health benefits that would be generated, suggest this is a policy that should be given serious consideration. INSET: The price cap scheme and the benefits it would bring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]