Economic Measurement and the Authorisation Process: The Expanding Place of Quantitative Analysis

Abstract

The paper takes the efficiency objective of the authorisation process under theCommerce Act 1986 as given. This objective makes competition law completely consistent with thrust of New Zealand public policy since the early 1980s. This has entailed the separation of efficiency and equity in policies and functions of government departments.4 Equity is treated through tax social welfare and access to health and education. The provision of goods and services is left to markets that are in most instances encouraged to be efficient by means of open entry few tariffs an absence of industry-specific special treatments and the implementation of the Act. Consequently there is no reason to adopt any special framework for measuring benefits and detriments for the public benefit test over those that would apply in the assessment of any aspect of the provision of any goods and services. Indeed the ramifications of quantifying the public benefits and detriments of economic efficiency are exactly those of economic welfare assessed by means of cost-benefit analysis. This paper examines the nature and the sources of increased quantification. Itargues that the costs of quantification are falling and the information yielded by it is growing so that it is likely that more rather than less quantification will be appropriate in the future. This change and increased the sophistication of the economic analyses and quantitative techniques make expertise in these areas an important ingredient of judgements about the evidence and change the nature of debate.