Privatisation and Public Ownership in Finland

30 Pages Posted: 21 Aug 2003

See all articles by Johan Willner

Johan Willner

Abo Akademi University - Department of Economics and Statistics

Date Written: August 2003

Abstract

Finland's state-enterprise sector has been larger than in most countries and included several manufacturing companies. These were usually established because of a scarcity of private venture capital, with a mission to contribute to industrialisation. Some companies have now been privatised in a process that has been fairly successful in its stated aims of generating revenues and achieving industrial restructuring. But the state-owned companies have also been fairly successful, so there is no evidence of improved financial performance or cost efficiency despite stronger focus on profits. Costs have on the other hand often been reduced in traditional public-sector industries, where private provision has increased with deregulation and/or competitive tendering and more commercial objectives. The consequences for allocative efficiency are however ambiguous, because of changes in quality and working conditions.

Keywords: privatisation, public ownership, Finland

JEL Classification: L32, L33, H42

Suggested Citation

Willner, Johan, Privatisation and Public Ownership in Finland (August 2003). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=436607 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.436607

Johan Willner (Contact Author)

Abo Akademi University - Department of Economics and Statistics ( email )

Piispankatu 16
Abo, Turku FIN-20500
Finland

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
558
Abstract Views
3,429
Rank
90,348
PlumX Metrics