International Hub Competition and Economic Welfare

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25380294
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Economic policy
• Research Institution: Kyoto University
• Principal Investigator: Mun Se-il 京都大学, 経済学研究科(研究院), 教授 (40192736)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): MORI Tomoya 京都大学, 経済研究所, 教授 (70283679)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: ハブ / 政府間競争 / 国際輸送 / インフラストラクチャ

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We develop a model of port competition in a setting with two ports located in different countries, serving their home market but also competing for transshipment traffic from a third region. Using the model, we investigate the choice of two governments whether to privatize its port or to keep port operations public. We show that there exist equilibria in which the two governments choose privatization. In these equilibria, national welfare is higher relative to a situation where both ports are public. We further extend the model to incorporate the scale economy in port operation and describe the strategic capacity choice of port operators. We investigate the effect of scale economy on the port capacities in equilibrium, and examine whether the resulting capacities are at the efficient level.

Free Research Field

交通経済学