The impact of ownership on price-setting in retail-energy markets—The German case

摘要: Abstract This paper analyzes whether public ownership has an impact on providers' price-setting. Under the assumption of more efficient energy provision which benefits customers a large number former monopolists have been privatized in line with liberalization markets Germany at end 1990s. However, current re-municipalizations are justified by similar arguments debate. Based dataset structure providers we find that property or private itself is not decisive factor for lower retail and wholesale prices. Rather, high concentration leads to low prices, regardless type owner. As investors often seek total provider, households, less willing switch, benefit least indirectly from ownership. Tests robustness our results applying different owner measures confirm independently underlying estimation specification.