Cost and Efficiency in Government Outsourcing: Evidence from the Dredging Industry
利用疏浚行业项目数据，构建动态模型分析政府外包决策，发现外包可大幅节约成本，但政府参与也能降低成本，直接竞争可减少总支出15.7%。
This paper investigates the how government outsourcing affects efficiency and expenditures by considering how outsourcing decisions are determined along two dimensions: (i) cost differences between private firms and government suppliers of public goods and (ii) dynamics arising from cost complementarities and capacity constraints. I formulate and estimate a dynamic model of government outsourcing using project-level data from the dredging industry. Model estimates indicate substantial cost savings due to outsourcing but also that government presence in the market yields cost reduction. A counterfactual policy featuring direct competition between government and private sector firms finds a total expenditure reduction of 15.7 percent.