Water works, electric utilities, and cable television: Contrasting historical patterns of ownership and regulation
This dissertation explicates some of the factors that have, in practice, shaped the choice and functioning of forms of government involvement in the provision of different goods and services. The inquiry focuses on the evolution of government involvement in three different urban public utility industries - water works, electric utilities, and cable television. Because they each employ fixed, specialized, and networked distribution systems, the three industries manifest similar natural monopoly forms of market failure. From similar beginnings, however, forms of government involvement in the three industries have evolved differently. In water works, the predominant trend has been to direct provision under municipal ownership; in electric utilities the trend has been toward continued private provision under state regulation; in cable television, franchise contracting has thus far survived, but in vitiated form. Detailed examinations of case studies as well as broad trend analyses are employed to help explain this outcome. It is found that neither direct competition between operating firms nor short-term contracting and recurrent bidding arrangements can be relied upon to consistently protect public interests in these services.
- Research Organization:
- Carnegie-Mellon Univ., Pittsburgh, PA (USA)
- OSTI ID:
- 5677125
- Resource Relation:
- Other Information: Thesis (Ph. D.)
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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