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The article provides information on the impact and history of deregulation of wheat industry in Australia, on the agricultural economics. Topics discussed include role of the Australian Wheat Board on the making of regulation and policies regarding agricultural sector; mentions details on consequences of Australian government's neoliberal ideology and market liberalisation on the wheat industry; and also mentions history of Supply chain costs in the agriculture sector.

Divergent regulatory practices in WTO compliance and external trade effects – The regulatory policy of EU ‘legislative’ institutions – The (de)regulatory policy of the ECJ – Explaining diverging regulatory practices – Policies behind diverging regulatory practices – Different institutional interaction in diverging regulatory practices – Should all EU institutions care what the world thinks? [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The recent deregulation in Canada's grain marketing sector with the resultant removal of the Canadian Wheat Board's single-desk status presents a useful case for policy and institutional analysis. This paper presents a comparative analysis of the Canadian case using deregulation in Australia as a reference. Case studies of deregulation in the two countries are presented, and the different approaches are compared. This is to predict the likely trajectory along which the Canadian Wheat Board may evolve. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deregulation of energy markets, penetration of renewables, advanced metering capabilities, and the urge for situational awareness, all call for system-wide power system state estimation (PSSE). Implementing a centralized estimator though is practically infeasible due to the complexity scale of an interconnection, the communication bottleneck in real-time monitoring, regional disclosure policies, and reliability issues. In this context, distributed PSSE methods are treated here under a unified and systematic framework. A novel algorithm is developed based on the alternating direction method of multipliers. It leverages existing PSSE solvers, respects privacy policies, exhibits low communication load, and its convergence to the centralized estimates is guaranteed even in the absence of local observability. Beyond the conventional least-squares based PSSE, the decentralized framework accommodates a robust state estimator. By exploiting interesting links to the compressive sampling advances, the latter jointly estimates the state and identifies corrupted measurements. The novel algorithms are numerically evaluated using the IEEE 14-, 118-bus, and a 4200-bus benchmarks. Simulations demonstrate that the attainable accuracy can be reached within a few inter-area exchanges, while largest residual tests are outperformed. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: This study contributes to the analysis of union pay compensation patterns in the trucking industry by considering the effect of intrastate deregulation on wage and nonwage compensation in the US trucking industry. Providing such an analysis contributes to gaining greater understanding of the persistence of relatively high union premiums in the for-hire sector following federal legislation promoting interstate competition. For-hire trucking still faced intrastate rate and entry regulation following interstate deregulation within this trucking sector. Hence, intrastate service could still generate rent to be shared with drivers. The passage of the Airport Improvement Act (AIA) of 1995 created a business environment that placed additional competitive pressure on rates by eliminating intrastate regulation. Given the stepped-up competition following this act, this study hypothesizes that for-hire union premiums should continue to decline if union drivers were the beneficiaries of regulatory rent. Findings using individual worker information support this study''s hypothesis. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article examines a case study of one industry in order to explore the factors influencing changing performance levels in the industries of post-socialist economies. It explores the influence on industrial performance of a number of once-only non-repetitive factors of market development that were typical of the transition period and compares them with longer term aspects of the market economy. The case that we discuss here is the development of the market for products of the Hungarian printing industry since the late 1980s. During the transition phase, privatisation, deregulation, the abolition of administrative distribution, and radical cuts in subsidies were all among the factors affecting this industry. Its supply chains also changed radically. However, these lost their importance after the transition had been completed and the long term processes of technical development and consumer behaviour became the main determinants of the behaviour of the printing companies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European policy-makers often speak of their efforts to 'manage globalization'. We argue that the advocacy of managed globalization is more than a rhetorical device and indeed has been a primary driver of major European Union (EU) policies over the past 25 years. We sketch the outlines of the concept of managed globalization, raise broad questions about its extent, and describe five major mechanisms through which it has been pursued: (1) expanding policy scope; (2) exercising regulatory influence; (3) empowering international institutions; (4) enlarging the territorial sphere of EU influence; and (5) redistributing the costs of globalization. These mechanisms are neither entirely novel, nor are they necessarily effective, but they provide the contours of an approach to globalization that is neither ad hoc deregulation nor old-style economic protectionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the aversion on the adoption of American aggregate litigation to the European reform with regards to legal enforcement in the U.S. The author notes that European reform has major repercussions due to deregulation and market liberalization, which possibly lead to civil litigation to prevent the harm and for the mobility of private enforcement. In this regard, the author sites the significance of the American-style actions that correspond the critiques of class actions in the U.S. but do not suggests to adopt the aggregate litigation of the U.S.

Deregulation in Europe started in 1987, paving the way for the low-cost model pioneered by Southwest Airlines in the US in a now liberalised European market, where any EU registered airline can fly on any route with any schedule, capacity or fare -- subject only to slot availability. The low-cost model differentiated itself by offering low fares through radically reduced costs in every conceivable facet of the business and capitalised on new forms of distribution. Changes in regulation have allowed airports to tap into the low-cost market as well, offering lower airport charges for terminals designed to a reduced specification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article argues that the August 2007 credit crisis is a direct consequence of the deregulation of the finance sector. One of the most important lessons ignored by the current predicament is that the interests of the private financial sector are opposed to the interests of society as a whole, and thus, have to be carefully regulated by bodies accountable to the public. It is estimated that the value of corporate debt insured as credit default swaps (CDS) is $60 trillion. It points out that CDS is a form of unregulated insurance that is taken out with unregulated insurance companies by lenders to companies. As a result, the ease with which credit can be created led to inflated value of assets.

Abstract: Customer requirements, new technologies and the deregulation and liberalisation measures of the last 15 years have had a significant influence on market structures in air freight transport in Europe. The study examines the sector using the concept of global production networks. It describes the reorganisation in various dimensions. Firstly, there is the development from single air freight forwarders to global networks of firms. Secondly, we find a reorganisation of inter-company relations. Thirdly, airlines around the world organise their air traffic as a hub system. This lends added importance to the selected hub airport, and puts pressure on them to enlarge. As spatial consequences there is greater competition among international airports. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: There has been continuous controversy over the impact of food market reforms on food security in Africa. In South Africa, the government and media have often questioned the effects of price deregulation of maize meal, the major staple food, on consumers. This article determines the effect of retail price deregulation on the size of maize milling/retail margins in South Africa. Regression models of monthly milling/retail margins are run from the period May 1976 to December 2004. To assess the robustness of our findings, we estimate several different models of structural change, vary the sample period to examine the sensitivity of findings to unusual weather and market conditions in the region during episodes between 2001 and 2004, and run the models using different estimation techniques, OLS with Newey-West robust estimators and Feasible General Least Squares. In virtually all models, the results indicate that real maize milling/retailing margins in South Africa have increased by at least 20% since the deregulation of retail prices in 1991. Moreover, there is evidence of trend growth in the size of the milling margin over time. Simulations indicate that the deregulation of maize meal prices has entailed a transfer of at least US$179 million/year from consumers to agents in the marketing system. Further study is needed to understand why this outcome in South Africa differs from findings in other countries in the region concerning the effects of reform on food marketing margins. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

For some time ‘regulatory reform’ has been a government watchword, and the streamlining and improved quality of regulation its professed ambition. Impact assessments (formerly known as regulatory impact assessments) are a significant ingredient in these governmental initiatives, now promoted by the newly created Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. Just as they have come to refer rather freely to the Explanatory Notes that now accompany all public Acts of Parliament, judges have also begun to invoke impact assessments when construing legislation. This paper investigates the extent of this practice and the manner in which judges employ impact assessments. It warns of the potential consequences if the judiciary avails itself too readily of these highly politicised, and sometimes deceptive, documents. ‘The aim of good prose words is to mean what they say.’ G. K. Chesterton, Daily News 22 April 1905 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This and a companion paper examine a new and fast-growing geographical research literature about neoliberal approaches to governing human interactions with the physical environment. This literature, authored by critical geographers for the most part, is largely case study based and focuses on a range of biophysical phenomena in different parts of the contemporary world. In an attempt to take stock of what has been learnt and what is left to do, the two papers survey the literature theoretically and empirically, cognitively and normatively. They are written for the benefit of readers trying to make some sense of this growing literature and for future researchers of the topic. Specifically, they aim to parse the critical studies of nature's neoliberalisation with a view to answering four key questions posed, variously, in many or most of them: what are the main reasons why all manner of qualitatively different nonhuman phenomena in different parts of the world are being 'neoliberalised'?; what are the principal ways in which nature is neoliberalised in practice?; what are the effects of nature's neoliberalisation?; and how should these effects be evaluated? Without such an effort of synthesis, this literature could remain a collection of substantively disparate, theoretically informed case studies unified only in name (by virtue of their common focus on 'neoliberal' policies). Though all four questions posed are answerable in principle, in practice the existing research literature makes questions two, three, and four difficult to address substantively and coherently between case studies. While the first question can, from one well-established theoretical perspective, be answered with reference to four 'logics' at work in diverse contexts (the focus of this paper), the issues of process, effects, and evaluations are currently less tractable (and are the focus of the next paper). Together, the two pieces conclude that critical geographers interrogating nature's neoliberalisation will, in future, need to define their objects of analysis more rigorously and/or explicitly, as well as their evaluative schemas. If the new research into neoliberalism and the nonhuman world is to realise its full potential in the years to come, then some fundamental cognitive and normative issues must be addressed. These issues are not exclusive to the literature surveyed and speak to the 'wider' lessons that can be drawn from any body of case study research that focuses on an ostensibly 'general' phenomena like neoliberalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Courts struggle with the tension between national competition laws, on the one hand, and state and local regulation, on the other--especially as traditional governmental functions are privatized and as economic regulation advances beyond its traditional role to address market monitoring. This Article defends a process-based account of the antitrust state-action exception against alternative interpretations, such as the substantive efficiency-preemption approach that Richard Squire recently advanced, and it elaborates on what such a process-based account would entail for courts addressing the role of state economic regulation as a defense in antitrust cases. It recasts the debate as focused around delegation issues and judicial deference to regulation--traditionally issues of administrative law. Courts frequently invoke antitrust state-action-exception issues where state officials fail to act or only act partially to regulate, as is increasingly common where states privatize governmental functions or attempt to deregulate, or implement competition policies of their own. As this Article argues, in such contexts a delegation model, which focuses on the conditions under which state legislative bodies have made delegations, whether agency regulators have standards, and the reasons provided by state and local officials for regulatory inaction, provides a more powerful and principled approach for evaluating the interaction between regulation and antitrust litigation than alternative approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors reject calls for reregulation. An alternative is to solicit offers for long-term contracts that specify fixed and generating prices for each plant. The contracts would specify the number of times a generator could be asked to shut down, as well as the availability and reliability of the unit. Units whose offers are accepted would be paid their fixed offer if they complied with the terms of the contract and their generation offer for each MWh they were asked to supply. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Industries face collective action and commitment problems when attempting to influence Congress. At the same time, an individual firm's political investments can yield reduced bureaucratic scrutiny by indicating that firm's willingness to contest agency decisions. We develop a model in which the desirability of maintaining a political footprint for this reason enables individual firms to commit to rewarding elected officials who maintain laws benefiting an entire industry. Our “dual forbearance” model anticipates that corporate political investments will be larger on average when statutes are stringent and that even pro-industry legislative coalitions will benefit politically from the existence of a minimal regulatory state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines changes in the New Labour core executive's approach to regulation and its relationship with risk, through analysing documentary, legislative and press sources concerning approaches to regulatory decision-making. It claims that an initial commitment to ‘better regulation’ has gradually been replaced by explicit support for deregulation. A reduction in the scope of regulation was also promoted by the Thatcher and Major governments. The New Labour core executive shares previous (Conservative) administrations’ concern to include business in deregulatory decision-making. However, the article claims that there is one significant difference in the New Labour deregulatory approach: a new toleration of risk. Deregulation is, now, described as a corrective to regulators’ over-reactions to perceived risks, which, it is claimed, are holding back economic and technological progress. However, this new approach excludes competing views concerning how risk should be regulated. In particular, it does not engage with widespread popular views that governments should continue to protect against risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses deregulation of the airlines industry and the Wright Amendment. The author traces the origins of the Wright Amendment and the impact it has had on airline carriers. He reviews proposed legislation to repeal the Wright Amendment and analyzes the apparent strengths and weaknesses. He suggests ways to address consumer interests both nationally and regionally. He discusses the opposition to the legislation and their interpretation of the compromises and violations of the anti-trust laws.

In this paper we describe the developments of European building regulatory systems and place them within the context of general trends in the regulatory sciences, particularly with reference to Europeanisation studies. Within the regulatory sciences there is broad consensus about the trend towards deregulation and privatisation in recent decades. Studies conducted under the rubric of ‘Europeanisation’ analyse the effects of European policies on the policy frameworks of the member states in more detail. Are the systems converging or diverging? Although the history of this kind of research is short, most authors agree that European policies have had a profound impact on the policies of the member states, but that this impact has not been uniform. In this paper, we analyse privatisation and deregulation trends within the building regulatory systems of eight European countries, and we consider whether the systems appear to be converging or diverging. We focus on three elements: the scope of the technical requirements, the building-permit procedures and the division of control and inspection responsibilities. The analyses reveal no evidence that the scope of technical requirements in European countries is diminishing. Through its directives, the European Union exercises a convergent influence on the contents, scope, and formulation of these technical requirements. In addition, all member countries are taking steps to streamline their administrative procedures. The importance of the role played by private organisations in checking and controlling regulations is increasing across the board. Although they differ in pace and emphasis, these administrative deregulation and privatisation trends exhibit a number of parallel developments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the general case of taxi deregulation in Australia. It particularly deals with three issues that arise when deregulating a taxi market which include the compensation of taxi license holders, the handling of transaction cost problems, and the management of fluctuating demand for taxi services. The author concludes that deregulation can only be done through intensive market reform.

Abstract: This paper presents a simple analytical model to compare electricity prices under regulation and deregulation. A deregulated electricity market cannot have too many producers because they will not be able to recover their investment costs. Nor can it have too few producers because the resulting market price will exceed the regulated rate. Constrained by the financial viability of privately owned generators and the policy goal of unregulated market price not exceeding the regulated rate, the set of feasible numbers of producers in the competitive market is very small, and at times empty. The small set of feasible numbers implies the likely failure of electricity deregulation, precisely because the post-reform number of producer is highly unlikely an element of the set. We verify this theoretical prediction using data applicable to Israel. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article discusses the effects of the introduction of economic reforms in New Zealand from 1984 to 1996, such as opening the country's economy and the implementation of deregulation laws to entrepreneurship. It tries to understand the context in which the reforms took place. It also compares the country's economic performance with Ireland's. Finally, the article gives few recommendations on how to create a progressive economy through the implementation of government reforms that does not go beyond what is considered the standard norm.

During the 1980's and 1990's deregulation had become the 'recipe' for many countries' economies to obtain increased efficiency and lower prices. Yet many empirical and theoretical studies of deregulation show that expectations rarely became fulfilled. The purpose of this paper is to develop the model of competition by introducing static and dynamic competition, which has different consequences for market performance. We claim that the development of static and/or dynamic competition post deregulation can be explained by structural conditions, both regarding entry barriers and customer influence. Four different competitive conducts are identified based on an explorative study of four deregulated industries: static, dynamic, hyper, and unheated competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The Australian Government over the last two decades has embarked on an intensive microeconomic reform program. Associated with this has been the deregulation of the rail sector. The mechanism of deregulation has been by vertically separating the below and above rail infrastructure and the creation of a number of rail access regimes. Evidence is emerging which indicates that the mechanism of deregulation is an impediment to the development of an integrated national network, the objective of deregulation and rail reform. This paper will discuss the mechanism of deregulation in Australia within the context of developments overseas. In particular it will discuss the development of a number of state specific rail access regimes and raise some problems and constraints being encountered in the reform process. The paper adds to a growing body of knowledge relating to infrastructure reform and deregulation and highlights some major constraints embedded in the model. The concluding section will discuss the relevance of past and current reform of Australian policies to rail policy makers outside Australia. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article examines the present state of deregulation in the telephony, electricity and airline markets in Canada. It is observed that not enough attention has been paid to the political issues involved in the deregulation of the markets. This has negatively affected the opportunity to benefit economically from deregulation. Policy makers should consider deregulation as a way to maximize social wealth subject to political constraints.

Financial deregulation was promoted in search of certain goals that, two decades after the beginning of the process, appear increasingly unattainable: to increase the capital base of productive concerns, making them stronger to face the cycle, to reduce the levels of debt, etc. This article argues that such objectives are now farther away than before deregulation and have become frankly improbable because deregulation has been gouverned by incomplete concepts. The path insinuated by the author to solve the problems posed by financial deregulation to the market economies is to look for a way to finish these processes, through a social struggle wich is only at its beginnings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deregulation of electricity markets is occurring all over the world. This trend introduces new risks and uncertainties into the electricity industry, the most significant being price risk. The spot price of electricity is highly volatile, and the ability to price risk management contracts on this commodity is contingent on a robust and realistic model of the underlying price process. One key driver of electricity spot price is the forced outages of generating plants in the system. The current paper describes a system aggregate model of short-term generating capacity that can be adapted to any generating system of interest. After describing the model, we test it using the IEEE Reliability Test System (RTS). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the economic prosperity of Africa discussed in the Commission for Africa's Report. This report adheres to the Post-Washington Consensus. The Washington Consensus, which held sway in the 1980s and early 1990s, focused narrowly on achieving the goal of economic growth by means of macroeconomic stabilisation, economic liberalisation, external opening, deregulation, privatisation, and minor institutional reform. This narrow neoliberal approach did not work, even according to those employed by the World Bank. This new consensus treats poverty reduction as a separate, or principal, goal of policy interventions, acknowledges that freeing markets and shrinking states are insufficient to trigger growth, but still holds that the best way forward involves embracing the private sector as the engine of development.

Significant steps toward deregulation and re-regulation of the transportation industry have occurred in the past decades. It is essential to anticipate and to monitor the effect of such reforms. In this study, we use a data-set from the Pacific Northwest––a region blessed with rich agricultural products. Essentially 100% of the dry peas and lentils produced in the United States are grown in eastern Washington, northern Idaho, and northeastern Oregon. This region is also noted for the variety of modal choice––including trucking, rail, and inland waterways––to ship bean products overseas. Bean products can be exported through ports in the West, Gulf or the East. The full choice of intrastate modes to Seattle/Portland (West) has led to a meticulous regulatory-policy within Washington State to face interstate modal-competition. Such intrastate policies may be more favorable toward Washington State, when interstate-regulation was rigid. We trace the modal choice before and after the deregulation of interstate road and rail transport for the period 1978–1982. A statistical study using a multinomial logit-model suggests that regulation had a major influence on modal choice. While intrastate transport was still regulated after interstate deregulation, shipments to overseas markets favored interstate routes over intrastate routes. This relationship should have significant bearing upon future regulatory reforms. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Examines the provisions of the Licensing Act of 2003 in Great Britain. Simplification and codification of alcohol and entertainment licensing law; Balance of liberalization and deregulation with new levels of protection for local residents and communities; Regulation of the supply of alcohol; Tightening and relaxation of controls.

Examines the effect of dairy deregulation on traditional farming in Queensland. Reponse of farmers to the economic pressures by reworking existing local traditions and suvival mechanism; Elaboration on the traditional practices and ideologies associated with the lifestyle and business practices of Tableand dairy farmers; Introduction of the National Competition POlicy by the government to support heightened levels of public expenditures.

Perhaps the most contentious issue surrounding trucking deregulation was its impacts on the structure and performance of general freight LTL carriers. Despite numerous studies, coincidence, but never causation, has been demonstrated with regard to post-deregulation increases in industry concentration. In the study reported here, changes in the structure of trucking serving Florida's ornamentals growers is examined over the same period. These carriers share some operational and fixed cost characteristics with general freight LTL carriers with regard to outbound movements with ornamentals (i.e., local pickup trucks, terminals, and linehaul vehicles), but act as TL carriers for their return movements. Of interest, ornamentals haulage never was regulated. While the parallels are not exact, overall the results suggest similar changes in concentration among ornamentals and general freight LTL carriers. This is consistent with the premise that changes in concentration in LTL were coincident with, rather than caused by, deregulation. However, even if the premise is true, deregulation may have facilitated more rapid adjustments to changes in underlying size-related economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Describes how the defects of overregulation inhibit Indian tribes as they attempt to enter into everyday business contracts. Necessity of deregulation of the anachronistic structure.

This paper revisits the issue of deregulation in New Zealand, and suggests that a previous account by the author in 1989 was overly influenced by the ethnocentricities of a British perspective which viewed New Zealand as a ‘laboratory’ for what might happen following agricultural deregulation in Europe. A revised account based on interviews conducted in 1994 suggests an approach to research which is more sensitive to different discursive narratives of agricultural change. Evidence of post-deregulation adjustments by farmers is reviewed, and the major discursive accounts of post-subsidy agriculture - by government, by Federated Farmers, and by academics - are discussed. These narratives have tended to ‘come together’ to present a mutually cohesive story of short-term pain and long-term gain. However, they tend to cloak the prospects for further painful adjustment in a ‘free market’ agriculture prone to fluctuating commodity prices, reorganization of the financing of agro-commodity production and prioritization of ethical issues in food production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of its general deregulation efforts, the Federal Communications Commission rescinded its "Anti-trafficking" rule permitting station owners to resell properties within three years of their initial acquisition. Critics argued that traffickers would be likely to behave to maximize short-term profits and station values, and would thus earn higher returns on their investment than other station owners. Examining station sales over the period 1973-1986, this study finds that "traffickers" have not been successful in achieving higher prices and returns to value than other station owners. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite deregulation of cable television systems by a decade-long string of federal actions, the typical municipality issues an exclusive cable franchise. This practice, which is now under serious legal challenge as an abuse of the First Amendment, is widely defended by local governments as efficient and necessary regulation of a "natural monopoly." This essay critiques this proconsumer view of franchising, examines the economic, social, and political costs of regulation, and suggests an alternative explanation for monopolistic cable franchising by local governments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Asserts that crude oil price deregulation and other near-best solutions for the energy industries are politically unattainable in the United States. Pricing of domestic crude oil; Economic rationale for the crude oil equalization tax; Policy implications of the study.

Explores the pattern of deregulation of corporate business across the states within the context of the interest group theory of the government in the U.S. History of corporate forms of businesses; Rationale for the adoption of pattern; Results of innovation in law.

The article takes a look at some of the inherent problems in comparing the differing approaches to airline deregulation across the Atlantic. Liberalization has happened in a progressive way and without major upsets. This contrasts with the situation that the US experienced at the time of deregulation of the aviation market. The European Community (EU)has been able to find the correct balance between competition and control mechanism. U.S. domestic aviation was heavily regulated from the late 1920s, initially as part of a policy to foster air mail services but subsequently on grounds of promoting safety and, from 1938, to seek economic efficiency. The U.S. liberalized market is mainly domestic, whereas that within the EU is predominantly international. The size of the European market is also reflected in the size of the EU's airlines. The U.S. reformed its domestic air transport market in a specific way but also in the context of a set of geographical, institutional, and economic conditions that were somewhat different from those pertaining in the EU.

The article examines the administrative consequences of the filed rate doctrine (FRD) and identifies directions for policy concerning its future role as it applies to motor freight common carriers in the U.S. Problems associated with FRD became a phenomena in the wake of the implementation of the Motor Carrier Act of 1980. The Interstate Commerce Commission responded to the enactment by relaxing regulations governing motor freight common carriers' tariffs. In addition, the agency removed the filing requirements for motor freight contracts. These changes intensified competition, spurred fierce rate discounting, driving many carriers into bankruptcy. The resulting disparities in transportation charges proved economically harmful to high rate paying shippers against other shippers who paid lower rates.

This article focuses on brokerage and the potential for electronic marketing of produce transportation in the United States. Brokers are the key factors in the produce transportation/distribution system. Between 1935 and the late 1970s there were fewer than 100 active Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) licensed brokers, versus nearly 6,000 by 1988. It is common, though inaccurate, to refer to the past decade's interstate motor carriage regulatory reforms as "deregulation." Rather, there was a loosening (not elimination) of regulations. That step (i.e., total deregulation) remains an option for public debate. Brokers of produce trucking are the only significant example of brokering in the absence of economic regulation. Indeed, as produce trucking never has been regulated, it may be considered an example of conditions after long-run adjustments to deregulation. It seems appropriate, therefore, to reexamine produce truck brokering. In this article, the overall importance and specific practices of produce truck brokers will be examined and compared to earlier results.

The article focuses on various aspects related to deregulation and information costs in the transportation industry of the U.S. The Motor Carrier Act of 1980 significantly deregulated the interstate for-hire motor carrier industry in the U.S. The paper investigates the question of the role of information costs on shippers as the result of deregulation. While significant numbers of new entrants have appeared in the truckload segment of the market, the less-than-truckload (LTL) market has also experienced significant new entrants in the sense of the pre-deregulation LTL carriers expanding the geographic scope of their markets. However, information costs to the shipper have been increased as a result of deregulation. Under regulation, rates were proposed by rate bureaus in a cartel-like setting and approved by the Interstate Commerce Commission. While independent actions were allowed by the Reed Bulwinkle Act, they were the exception. After deregulation, rates could differ dramatically in the same marketplace as carriers utilized information asymmetries and the monopoly powers, which they conferred.

The results of deregulation in the LTL sector have been the opposite of what was predicted by the deregulators. Instead of more competition, this paper documents the increasing concentration of both revenues and profits. Instead of more competitors, there are fewer firms in this segment of the industry now than prior to deregulation and open entry. Bankruptcies and voluntary departures (often because of impending doom) have thinned the ranks of competitors and there has been essentially no new entry. The new competition has been expansion by the larger carriers. This has often placed the smaller in-cumbants under extreme pressure. While the truckload industry may very well function according to the theory of pure competition, the same is not true of the LTL business. There are significant financial barriers to entry. Operating economics of size appear to give the larger carriers a possible cost advantage. In any case, the nature of the LTL marketplace and the fact that there is a trend towards shippers using fewer carriers gives the giant carriers that can offer nationwide service a natural advantage called "marketing economies." Such a marketing advantage for the giants would place smaller carriers at a disadvantage even in the absence of any size economies on the cost side. The dismal distribution of profit that has been documented in this paper is not encouraging for the smaller and medium-sized firms. Mergers, wage concessions, and geographic expansion are one possible road to survival. Perhaps the opposite approach, pulling back to a more potentially profitable and less exposed niche, is another strategy. However, with excess capacity in the industry and excessive rate discounting continuing unabated, no strategy will quarantee survival. It is still a guess as to when the LTL industry will reach solvent stability. Only one thing is certain. When that stability does finally arrive, the industry will bear no resemblance to what was predicted by the deregulators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]