Location: EU
More Commitment is Needed to Improve Efficiency in EU Fiscal Spending

The member states of the European Union coordinate on many policy areas. The joint implementation of public good type projects, however, has stalled. Centralized fiscal spending in the European Union remains small and there exists an overwhelming perception that the available funds are inefficiently allocated. Too little commitment, frequent rounds of renegotiation and unanimous decision rules can explain this pattern.
Currently, the EU allocates only about 0.4% of its aggregate GDP to centralized public goods spending (European Commission (2014)). This is surprising given the fiscal federalism literature’s classic predictions of efficiency gains from coordinated public goods provision (see for example Oates (1972) and the more recent contributions of Lockwood (2002) and Besley and Coate (2003) for a discussion). Yet, recent proposals to expand centralized fiscal spending in the EU have been met with skepticism if not outright rejection. The most frequently cited argument claims existing funds are already being allocated inefficiently and any expansion of centralized spending would turn the EU into a mere transfer union (Dellmuth and Stoffel (2012) provide a review).
Centralized fiscal spending in the EU is provided through the “Structural and Cohesion Funds”, which are part of the EU’s so called “Regional Policy” and were initially instituted in 1957 by the Treaty of Rome for the union to “develop and pursue its actions leading to the strengthening of its economic, social and territorial cohesion” (TFEU (1957), Article 174). At that point, the six founding members agreed it was important to “strengthen the unity of their economies and to ensure their harmonious development by reducing the difference existing between the various regions and the backwardness of the less favoured regions” (stated in the preamble of the same treaty). A reform in 1988 has further emphasized this goal by explicitly naming cohesion and convergence as the main objectives of regional policy in the EU.
Today, actual fiscal spending in the EU is far from achieving this goal. The initially agreed upon contribution schemes are often reduced by nation specific discounts and special provisions as the most recent budget negotiations for the 2014-2020 spending cycle showed yet again. Moreover, the perception is that available funds are being spent inefficiently (see for example Sala-i-Martin (1996) and Boldrin and Canova (2001)).
Figure 1. 2011 EU Structural and Cohesion Funds
Figure 1 shows the national contributions to the structural funds as well as EU spending from that same budget in each member nation in per capita terms (data published by the European Commission). If fiscal spending was efficiently structured to achieve the above mentioned goal of convergence, one would observe a strong negative correlation between contributions and spending. The data shows, however, that while some redistribution is clearly implemented, rich nations still receive large amounts of the funds meant to alleviate inequality in the union (see Swidlicki et al. (2012) for a detailed analysis of this pattern for the contributions to and spending of structural funds in the UK).
What prevents a group of sovereign nations from effectively conducting the basic fiscal task of raising and allocating a budget to achieve an agreed upon common goal? In a recent paper, we theoretically examine the structure of the bargaining and allocation process employed by the EU (Simon and Valasek (2013)). Our analysis suggests that efficiency both in terms of raising contributions and allocating fiscal spending cannot be expected under the current institutional setting. While poorly performing local governments, low human capital in recipient regions, and corruption might all play a role in creating inefficiency (see for example Pisani-Ferry et al. (2011) for a discussion of the Greek case), improving upon those will only solve part of the problem.
We demonstrate that the inefficiency of EU spending in promoting the goal of convergence can be explained by the underlying institutional structure of the EU, where sovereign nations bargain over outcomes in the shadow of veto. Specifically, we model the outcome of the frequent negotiation rounds employed by the EU as the so-called Nash bargaining solution, explicitly taking into account the possibility for each member nation to veto and to withdraw its contribution (as the UK threatened in the most recent budget negotiations). It turns out that it is precisely the combination of voluntary participation, unanimity decision rule and the lack of a binding commitment to contribute to the joint budget that generally prevents efficient fiscal spending. In such a supranational setting, the distribution of relative bargaining power arises endogenously from countries’ contributions and their preferences over different joint projects. This creates a link between contributions to and allocation of the budget that is absent in federations, where contributions to the federal budget cannot simply be withdrawn and spending vetoed. Since the EU members lack such commitment, this link will necessarily lead to an inefficient outcome.
Why Does the EU Have These Institutions?
If the currently employed bargaining process cannot lead to an efficient outcome, why then did the EU member nations not institute a different allocation process right from the start? Of course, agreeing on a binding contract without the possibility for individual veto is politically difficult. More complicated bargaining processes may also be much more costly in terms of administration than is relying on informal negotiations and mutual agreement. Our analysis suggests another alternative: If the potential members of the union are homogeneous with respect to their income and the social usefulness (or spillovers) of the projects they propose to be implemented in the union, then Nash bargaining will actually lead to the budget being raised and allocated efficiently. The intuition behind this result is simple: If all countries have the same endowment, their opportunity costs of contributing to the joint budget are the same. Moreover, symmetric spillovers do not give one country a higher incentive to participate in the union than the other. Consequently, all countries have the exact same bargaining position. Thus, equilibrium in the bargaining game must produce equal surpluses for all nations. At the same time, with incomes and spillovers perfectly symmetric, the efficient allocation also produces the same surplus for each nation, so that it coincides with the Nash bargaining solution. It is important to notice, though, that symmetric income and spillovers do not imply homogeneous preferences: Each nation can still prefer its “own” project to the others. Instead, symmetry leads to a perfectly uniform distribution of bargaining power in equilibrium. Moreover, our analysis shows that efficiency is achieved if the union budget is small relative to domestic consumption and member countries have similar incomes.
This resonates well with the history of the European Union. In fact, the disparities between the founding members were not large, so that the current bargaining institutions could reasonably have been expected to yield efficiency. Only the inclusion of Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain created a more economically diverse community (European Movement (2010)). Our model shows that as the asymmetries between member countries or the importance of the union relative to domestic consumption grow, Nash bargaining leads to increasingly inefficient outcomes. Figure 2 shows this effect for a union of two nations. Keeping aggregate income constant and assuming symmetric spillovers between the two nations’ preferred projects, we vary asymmetry in their domestic incomes. The graphs show the Nash bargaining outcome (marked with superscript NB) compared to the generally efficient solution. As country A’s income increases, so does its outside option (i.e. all else equal, the higher the income, the less a country would lose if the joint projects were not implemented). Thus, country A’s bargaining position relative to country B increases in equilibrium, leading to an inefficient outcome. The allocation of funds to the union projects (upper right panel) depicts this channel very clearly: While the efficient allocation is independent from the distribution of national incomes, the Nash bargaining solution reflects the changing distribution of power. Nation A is able to tilt the allocation more toward its own preferred project the higher its income. Moreover, it is able to negotiate a “discount” for its contribution. While its contribution (labeled xa) does increase with its income (labeled ya), country A still pays less than would be budgetary efficient given its higher income (upper left panel). As a result of the inefficiencies introduced by the bargaining process, aggregate welfare in the union declines as asymmetry grows. Again, it is worth noting, that the loss in aggregate welfare is relatively small when asymmetry is small, but grows more than proportionally as the countries become more and more unequal (lower right panel).
Figure 2. The Effect of a Union of Two CountriesThis has troubling implications for the EU, as income asymmetry has increased with every subsequent round of expansion while the bargaining procedure for the fiscal funds has essentially stayed the same. It is not surprising then that a larger and more asymmetric EU has resulted in supranational spending that is increasingly inefficient.
The EU as a “Transfer Union”
We go on to show that the level of redistribution inherent in the Nash bargaining solution depends crucially on the overall size of the budget the union intends to raise. Increasing the EU’s budget for centralized fiscal spending would indeed lead to more “transfers” to low income members (in terms of net contributions), bringing the EU closer to the original goal of convergence. In fact, the EU could pick a budget such that inequality in terms of total welfare between member nations is completely alleviated. Such an outcome necessarily implies that the net gain from being part of the union for high-income nations is lower (albeit still positive) than for low-income members. However, this in turn has consequences for the endogenous distribution of bargaining power: Richer nations would be able to assert even more power and push even further for their own preferred projects, rendering the allocation of funds across projects less efficient. This trade-off between equality and efficiency implies that complete convergence is not necessarily socially desirable.
Arguably, this trade-off might be more important for a transition period than in the long run. If fiscal spending does not only lead to convergence in instantaneous welfare, but also has a positive effect on long-run performance and GDP growth, income asymmetries across countries will decrease even if the allocation of spending across projects is not entirely efficient. Less inequality in turn will lead to a more efficient allocation process in the future and endogenously reduce the level of necessary transfers. However, whether the growth effect of the EU’s structural funds is indeed positive remains a much-debated empirical question (see for example Becker et al. (2012)).
Institutions Fit for a Diverse Union
As the EU has expanded from the original six nations to the current 27, there has been a concurrent evolution of decision-making rules. A qualified majority rule is now used in many areas of competency. We show that the allocation of fiscal spending could also benefit from the implementation of a majority rule. Efficiency would be improved as long as the low-income member nations endogenously select into the majority coalition while their contributions to the budget remain relatively low. In connection to this, the EU might benefit from enforcing rules specifying contributions as a function of national income (such rules exist, but are easily and often circumvented), forcing wealthier member nations to pay more. An exogenous tax rule without the possibility to negotiate a discount, for example, may indeed improve overall efficiency.
It is important to note, however, that a unanimous approval of such a change is unlikely. The institutional mechanism of Nash bargaining is an “absorbing state” after the constitution stage, in the sense that not all member nations can be made better off by switching to an alternative institution. Therefore, the discussion of alternative institutions and decision making processes is particularly relevant when considering new mechanisms that increase fiscal spending at the union level, such as the proposed EU growth pact. If the same bargaining process remains to be employed even for new initiatives, even though a majority rule is preferable and implementable relative to the status quo, the opportunity for the EU to achieve efficiency in its fiscal spending is lost.
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References
- Becker, S. O., Egger, P and von Ehrlich, M (2012) “Too Much of a Good Thing? On the Growth Effects of the EU’s Regional Policy”, European Economic Review 56: 648 – 668
- Besley, T. and Coate, S. (2003) “Centralized versus Decentralized Provision of Local Public Goods: A Political Economy Approach” Journal of Public Economics 87: 2611 – 2637
- Boldrin, M and Canova, F (2001) ”Europé’s Regions – Income DIsparities and Regional Policies” Economic Policy 32: 207 – 253
- Delmuth, L.M. and Stoffel, M.F. (2012) “Distributive Politics and Intergovernmental Transfers: The Local Allocation of European Structural Funds” European Union Politics 13: 413 – 433
- European Commission (2014) Data available at http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/what/future/index_en.cfm
- European Movement (2010) “The EU’s Structural and Cohesion Funds” Expert Briefing, available at http://www.euromove.org.uk/index.php?id=13933
- Lockwood, B. (2002) “Distributive Politics and the Cost of Centralization” The Review of Economic Studies 69: 313 – 337
- Oates, W.E. (1972) “Fiscal Federalism” Harcourt-Brace, New York
- Pisani-Ferry, J., Marzinotto, B. and Wolff, G. B. (2011) “How European Funds can Help Greece Grow” Financial Times, 28 July 2011.
- Sala-i-Martin, X (1996) ”Regional Cohesion: Evidence and Theories of Regional Growth and Convergence”, European Economic Review 40: 1325 – 1352
- Simon, J. and Valasek, J.M. (2013) “Centralized Fiscal Spending by Supranational Unions” CESifo Working Paper No. 4321.
- Swidlicki, P., Ruparel, R., Persson, M. and Howarth, C. (2012) “Off Target: The Case for Bringing Regional Policy Back Home” Open Europe, London.
- TFEU (1957) “Treaty Establishing the European Community (Consolidated Version)”, Rome Treaty, 25 March 1957, available at: http://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b39c0.html
Reputation for Quality and Entry in Procurement: Is there a Trade-Off?

How much weight should be given to past performance indicators when selecting contractors? Does a large weight assigned to suppliers’ previous performance deter entry by new, innovative suppliers that have no track records for the very reason that they are new? If yes, how should we take this into account when designing procurements for firms or governments? This note describes recent research that sheds light on these questions crucial for every government and organization.
Introduction
How should past performance be accounted for when selecting (public or private) contractors? On one hand, giving large weight to suppliers’ previous performance in assigning contracts may improve incentives in procurement; on the other hand, it may deter entry by new, innovative suppliers for the very reason that they are new. Are there ways to structure procurement rules and procedures to minimize or eliminate these costs? How can well performing suppliers be rewarded, but not at the expense of losing the most innovative start-ups, that could pose important positive externalities on the buyer and on society overall? These questions are important ones and every procurement manager, in the private and public sector, should know how to answer, or at least how to think about, them. Unfortunately, if one looks at the leading management and operations textbooks, or at public procurement textbooks, it is hard to find a line that could help in making these crucial decisions. The only procurement book that at least mentions these crucial questions, to our knowledge, is the Handbook of Procurement (2006; see Ch. 18, by Dellarocas et al.). However, even that handbook falls short in providing evidence-based or – more generally – research-based guidance for these questions. This is the case because there is practically no research dealing with these everyday problems. One recent exception is an experimental study recently undertaken by Butler, Carbone, Conzo and Spagnolo (2013) that will be discussed in depth in the reminder of this brief.
Public Policy Relevance
Before getting into the results of this recent study, let me provide some background information that will give an idea of the relevance of these questions for public policy.
Public procurement currently accounts for between 15% and 20% of the GDP in developed countries (see http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/ict/pcp/key_en.html). In 2011, the total public procurement market in the EU – i.e. the purchases of goods, services and public works by governments and public utilities – reached a size of approximately €2,500 billion, corresponding to 19 percent of GDP (see e.g. http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/publicprocurement/docs/modernising_rules/public-procurement-indicators-2011_en.pdf). As Table 1 below shows, despite year-to-year fluctuations, there has been an overall increase in procurement expenditures relative to 2007 levels, both absolutely and proportionately. The increasing shift in focus in EU innovation policies, from “push-based” mechanisms like R&D subsidies/tax breaks towards demand-led “pull” mechanisms, like Pre-Commercial Procurement, is likely to further increase the volume of this market.
Table 1: Total EU procurement expenditure on works, goods and services In EUR billion
2007 |
2008 |
2009 |
2010 |
2011 |
2,178.55 |
2,263.62 |
2,346.00 |
2,416.52 |
2,405.89 |
2007 |
2008 |
2009 |
2010 |
2011 |
17.6 |
18.1 |
20.0 |
19.7 |
19.0 |
The enormous size of this market notwithstanding, we know relatively little about whether, when, and how buyers should use reputational indicators based on past performance in selecting among sellers, and whether the use of such indicators necessarily reduces the ability of new sellers—i.e., sellers with no history of past performance—to enter the market.
It is well known that reputational mechanisms that reward past performance are important governance tools that complement (and sometimes substitute for) contracts in private transactions (Calzolari and Spagnolo 2009). Private buyers, however, are typically only concerned about the price and quality of the good they buy. Regulators in charge of public procurement, instead, are usually also concerned that the public procurement process is transparent and open for obvious accountability reasons. The need to prevent favoritism and corruption has led lawmakers around the world to ensure that open and transparent auctions where bidders are treated equally—even when in some crucial dimensions they have very different track records—are used whenever possible.
The trend in the US
The costs of limiting discretion to ensure public buyers’ accountability – such as the possibly large cost of not allowing reputational forces to complement incomplete procurement contracts – were stressed by Kelman (1990), who pushed for a deep reform of the US procurement system when he was the head of public procurement during the Clinton administration. The reform was targeted at reducing the rigidity of procurement rules in the Federal Acquisition Regulations and allowing public buyers to adopt more flexible purchasing practices common in the private sector, including giving more weight to suppliers’ past performance. Since the Federal Acquisitions Streamlining Act of 1994, US federal departments and agencies are expected to record past contractors’ performance evaluations and share them through common platforms for use in future contractor selection.
However, the US Senate recently expressed the apparently widespread concern that past performance-based selection criteria could hinder new and small businesses’ ability to enter and compete effectively, leading to an intriguing, but inconclusive report by the General Accountability Office.
This is not to say that US regulators were not concerned with the ability of small and medium enterprises (SME) – sometimes the most innovative part of the economy – to enter public procurement markets. In the US, this long-held concern led to large programs like the Small Business Act, with its rules limiting the bundling of public demand in very large procurements and establishing the Small Business Agency, and the ‘set aside’ (procurement only open to SMEs) common in many types of procurement auctions. However, the worry that past-performance based selection may contribute to the exclusion of novel and smaller firms only arose in the last couple of years.
The (opposite) trend in the EU
The European Union has instead been moving precisely in the opposite direction. An important concern driving procurement regulation in Europe since the Treaty of Rome has been helping the process of common market integration by increasing cross-border procurement, i.e., the amount of goods and services each EU Member State buys from contractors based in other states. The EU Procurement Directives that coordinate public procurement regulation in the various European states have been limiting the use of past-performance information in the process of selecting among offers—a feature that came under broad attack during the 2011 consultation for the revision of the EU Directives (see Replies to the Consultation on the 2011 EU Green Book on Public Procurement regulation). The EU regulators appear to have been always convinced that using reputational indicators as a criteria for selecting contractors leads to manipulations in favour of local incumbents, at the expense of cross-border procurement and market integration. (see e.g., http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/publicprocurement/modernising_rules/consultations/index_en.htm).
Only very recently – now that the US is moving towards reconsidering the effects, and possibly limiting the use of past-performance indicators – has the EU started to move (again in the opposite direction to the US) towards leaving more space to these indicators, perhaps as a reaction to the comments they received in recent consultations.
Finally, to have an idea of the lack of research-based knowledge guiding policy in this field, note that in some cases EU regulation already acknowledges the crucial importance of past-performance based reputation for some types of procurement. For example, the European Research Council (ERC) provides funding to top researchers in Europe, who are selected through peer review, and the track record of the researchers is usually the main awarding criterion. ERC funding is distributed almost exclusively based on reputation criteria in order to support the best and the brightest. Other European instruments for the procurement of research, such as the FET-OPEN program, are based on a strictly enforced, completely anonymous evaluation instead, without obvious reasons justifying this opposite approach. On the dedicated homepage of these programs it states: “The anonymity policy applied to short proposals has changed and is strictly applied. The part B of a short STREP proposal may not include the name of any organization involved in the consortium nor any other information that could identify an applicant. Furthermore, strictly no bibliographic references are permitted.”
Reputation and Entry in Procurement
In a recent research paper (Butler, Carbone, Conzo and Spagnolo, 2013) we have been trying to fill at least part of this knowledge gap and offer some initial evidence-based guidelines for future policy.
The study
We build a simple model of repeated procurement with limited enforcement and potential entry and implement it in the laboratory. We focus on reputation as an incentive system to limit moral hazard in the quality dimension as well as on the effect of reputation on selection through entry. We assume that some costly-to-produce quality dimension of supply, although observable to the parties, is too costly to verify for a court to be governed through explicit contracting and is therefore left to reputational governance. We make the additional assumption that there is a potential entrant firm that is more efficient than all incumbent firms. In this context, we study how quality, price, entry and welfare change with the introduction of a simple and transparent reputational mechanism. This mechanism rewards an incumbent firm that chooses to provide (costly) high-quality production with a bid subsidy in the subsequent procurement auction, and may also award a bid subsidy (of varying size) to an entrant with no history of production.
Note that in the case of public procurement and of firms’ vendor rating systems, we are talking about reputational mechanisms based on public rules, known and accepted by suppliers. Formal mechanisms and rules give commitment power to the buyer and can be designed in many different ways. A common mistake is to assume that reputational mechanisms must be designed along the line of the eBay feedback system, in which new sellers start with “zero reputation”. However, a buyer with some commitment power concerning the rules for information aggregation and diffusion and for selecting suppliers may well award a positive rating to new entrants—e.g. the maximum possible rating, or the average rating in the market, putting entrants at less of a disadvantage—and ensure that this is taken into account by the scoring rule that selects the contractor, even if the contractor has never before interacted with the buyer. Indeed, private corporations often have vendor rating systems in which all suppliers start off with the same maximal reputational capital—a given number of points—and then lose points when performing poorly and are suspended for some time if their reputational capital falls below a certain low threshold. This type of vendor rating system creates an advantage for new suppliers, most likely stimulating rather than hindering entry, suggesting that it is possible to design a reputational mechanism in public procurement that simultaneously sustains quality and entry.
The results
First of all, the study shows that concerns about reputation-based selection hindering entry are justified: naively introducing a “standard” reputational mechanism in which only good past performance is rewarded with a bid subsidy in the following procurement auction increases quality provision, but it also significantly reduces entry.
In contrast to this first result, the study goes on to show that properly designed reputational mechanisms in which new entrants, with no history of past performance, are awarded a moderate or high reputation score—as is often done in the private sector—actually foster rather than hinder entry while, at the same time, delivering a substantial increase in high quality goods provision.
The third important result of this study is that the total cost to buyers (buyer’s transfer) does not increase when a reputational mechanism is introduced, even though (costly) quality provision increases. The introduction of bid subsidies for good past performance appears to benefit the buyer/taxpayer by increasing competition for incumbency, driving winning bids down sufficiently to offset the potential increase in procurement costs due to bid subsidies.
Conclusions
Considered together, the findings in Butler et al. (2013) suggest that there need not be a trade-off between reputation and entry in procurement, and that the debates both in the EU and the US are rather misplaced. The results suggest that the dual goals of providing incentives for quality provision and increasing entry and cross-border procurement – in the EU or elsewhere – are achievable through an appropriately designed reputational mechanism. Policy makers should therefore probably stop quarrelling about whether a generic past-performance based reputational mechanism should be introduced, and instead focus on how such a mechanism should be designed.
References
- Butler Jeff, Carbone Enrica, Conzo Pierluigi and Giancarlo Spagnolo. 2013. “Reputation and Enty in Procurement.” CEPR Discussion Paper No. 9651.
- Calzolari, Giacomo and Giancarlo Spagnolo. 2009. “Relational Contracts and Competitive Screening.” CEPR Discussion paper No. 7434.
- European Commission. 2011. Green Paper on the modernisation of EU public procurement policy Towards a more efficient European Procurement Market. Available at http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/consultations/index_en.htm
- European Commission. 2011. Green Paper on the modernisation of EU public procurement policy Towards a more efficient European Procurement Market. Synthesis of Replies. Available at http://ec.europa.eu/internal_market/consultations/docs/2011/public_procurement/synthesis_document_en.pdf
- Government Accountability Office. 2011. (GAO-12-102R, Oct. 18, 2011). Prior Experience and Past Performance as Evaluation Criteria in the Award of Federal Construction Contracts. Available at http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-12-102R
- Kelman, Steven. 1990. Procurement and Public Management: The Fear of Discretion and the Quality of Government Performance: American Enterprise Institute Press.
- Yukins, Christoher. 2008. “Are IDIQS Inefficient? Sharing Lessons with European Framework Contracting.” Public Contract Law Journal, 37(3): 545-568.
Trade Policy Uncertainty and External Trade: Potential Gains of Ukraine Joining the CU vs. the Signing Free Trade Agreement with the EU

This policy brief summarizes the results of recent research which predicts gains in Ukrainian exports from signing a deep and comprehensive free trade agreement with EU, and compares these gains with predicted gains from joining the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia. We argue that the gains would be mostly due to elimination of uncertainty in trade policy of Ukraine with the CU and the EU countries. We find that European integration brings higher potential for export growth, and that it also shifts the structure of Ukrainian exports towards capital goods, reducing the share of raw materials in total export.
Trade Policy Uncertainty and Export
Trade policy uncertainty (TPU) is a powerful negative factor that prevents economy from the realization of its export potential. In a recent paper, Handley and Limao (2012) argue that since the exporting decision involves substantial fixed costs, TPU significantly affects investment and entry decisions in international trade. In particular, they show that preferential trade agreements (PTAs) are important even when the pre-PTA tariff barriers are low. Comparing pre- and post-EU accession patterns of Portuguese exports, they find that Portuguese trade increased dramatically after 1985. The increase was the largest towards the EU partners, suggesting that it was caused by the accession. Export expanded through considerable entry of Portuguese firms into EU markets, even in industries where applied tariffs did not change. Handley and Limao estimated that the tariff reduction, which averaged 0.66 percentage points, has been responsible for only 20 percent of the increase in exports to EU10 after the EU accession, while 80 percent of the increase was due to resolving TPU.
Handley and Limao further argue that the Portuguese example should be highly relevant for any small open economy, facing important trade policy choices. In this regard, Ukraine is facing a very hard choice of selecting its regional integration strategy – towards the EU or the Customs Union (CU) with Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, resulting in severe TPU. The options are mutually exclusive since the CU trade policy is not compatible with neither the WTO commitments of Ukraine, or with the parameters of the deep and comprehensive free trade agreement (FTA) between Ukraine and the EU, finalized in 2012. Average tariff protection within the CU in 2012 was 10 percent (Shepotylo and Tarr, 2012), while the average WTO binding tariff rates in Ukraine were only 5 percent; the parameters of the FTA with the EU are even less protective, which would cause even stronger disagreements regarding the tariff schedules. Moreover, technical and phyto-sanitary standards in the EU and the CU are different; therefore, it would be extremely hard to harmonize the Ukrainian standards with both of them.
Despite low tariff protection, uncertainty on the parameters of the long run trade policy of Ukraine with the CU and EU countries is extremely high. It is crucial for both foreign and domestic investors to understand in what direction the regional integration will proceed before making decisions on investing or exporting, since these decisions can incur substantial sunk costs. Suppose that a large European multinational firm were interested in including Ukrainian companies in its production chains only if Ukraine signs the FTA with the EU (integrate vertically). If Ukraine instead joined the CU, this presumed European company would rather be interested in horizontal integration and invest by building a plant for final assembly of products to serve the Ukrainian and CIS markets. For Russian companies the situation would be the reversed. They would be interested to integrate vertically if Ukraine is a member of the CU and integrate horizontally if Ukraine signed FTA with EU. However, since vertical and horizontal integration are quite different strategies, neither European nor Russian companies invest in Ukraine before the uncertainty is resolved. The same holds true for domestic companies which would like to extend their export activities to new markets. Since entrance to new markets is costly and requires some irreversible investment, it is optimal to wait until the policy uncertainty is resolved.
Modeling Trade Policy Options of Ukraine
In Shepotylo (2013), we investigate which integration scenario is more preferable for Ukraine under the assumption that TPU is fully resolved and Ukraine trades up to its potential. Based on export data in 2001-2011, we estimate the gravity model by Helpman, Melitz, and Rubinstein (2008) method, adjusted for panel data case and endogeneity of a decision to sign a PTA. Using this model, we predict bilateral exports of Ukraine under three counterfactual scenarios: a) Ukraine joined the Customs Union in 2009 (CU); b) Ukraine signed the FTA with the EU in 2009 (EU FTA); c) Ukraine joined the EU in 2009 (EU). The model predictions take into account the level of economic development, geographical location, industrial structure, and quality of government and regulatory agencies. It also accounts for macro trends, including the global trade collapse of 2008-2009.
The results are not intended for a short-term forecast, but should be rather used as indicators of the long-run effects. Their interpretation is as follows. Suppose that Ukraine has signed the FTA with the EU in 2009. Taking into account all observable characteristics of Ukraine, what would be the level of Ukrainian export of product k to country j, if Ukraine, in all other respects, would behave as a typical country-member of the FTA EU? That would involve removal of the trade policy uncertainty, stronger integration of domestic companies into the global supply chains, and increase in foreign direct investments from the EU countries.
Unlike the studies based on the Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) method, which assumes that the policy choice affects the economy only marginally through reduced tariff barriers, and that the underlying economic structure and expectations of the economic agents remain intact, the gravity model captures all changes that occur in the economy over the investigated period and extract the differences in export flows between any two counterfactual scenarios, given all background economic changes.
Results
Our main results are as follows. First, the actual exports of Ukraine are far below their potential, compared with performance of both the CU countries and the FTA EU countries. The expected long run gains in Ukrainian exports to all countries under the CU scenario are equal to 17.9 percent above the export level in 2009-2011. The corresponding number for the FTA EU scenario is 36 percent, and for the full EU scenario, 46.1 percent. Based on 2011, the export of Ukraine would have been 98 billion US dollars under the EU scenario, 91 billion US dollars under the FTA EU scenario, and 72 billion US dollars under the CU scenario. All these numbers should be compared with the actual 68 billion US dollars of Ukrainian export in 2011.
Figure 1. Ukrainian Export under the Different Scenarios
Second, any scenario predicts that Ukraine severely underperforms in its trade with both CIS and EU countries, while its export to the rest of the world is in line with the predictions of the model. These results are consistent with the theory that unresolved TPU in relationships with the CIS and EU countries severely hurts the Ukrainian export potential to these countries.
Table 1. Ukrainian Export under the Different Scenarios
Third, CU integration would be more beneficial for the Ukrainian agriculture and food industry, while FTA EU or full EU integration would be more beneficial for textiles, metals, machinery and electrical goods, and transportation. Conditional on not worsening its market access to Russia, Ukraine would expand its trade in these sectors to all countries, including Russia and other members of CU.
Figure 2. Expected Increase of Ukrainian Export under the Different ScenariosFinally, the CU integration would lead to a small increase in the share of capital goods from 17 percent to 20 percent of total exports. FTA EU would increase the share of capital goods to 28 percent, while full EU integration would increase it to 29 percent. In all scenarios, the share of raw materials would decline from 16 percent to 10-12 percent. The share of intermediate goods would decline from 48 percent to around 40 percent under the two EU scenarios and would only marginally decrease under the CU scenario. The share of consumer goods would remain stable around 20 percent.
Conclusions
Ukraine would be better off by signing a deep and comprehensive trade agreement with the EU and integrate into its production chains than joining the CU. Right now, Ukraine severely underperforms by exporting far below its potential. Evidence shows that high trade policy uncertainty plays a large role in Ukraine’s poor performance, since the gap between actual and potential exports are mainly due to low levels of export to the EU and CIS countries. Moreover, Ukraine should be interested in moving the integration process even further, because EU accession would bring even better results.
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References
- Handley, K., & Limão, N. (2012). Trade and investment under policy uncertainty: theory and firm evidence (No. w17790). National Bureau of Economic Research.
- Helpman, E., Melitz, M., & Rubinstein, Y. (2008). Estimating trade flows: Trading partners and trading volumes. The Quarterly Journal of Economics,123(2), 441-487.
- Shepotylo, O., & Tarr, D. (2012). Impact of WTO accession and the customs union on the bound and applied tariff rates of the Russian federation. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, (6161).
Tax Meat to Save the Baltic Sea

In a world of perfect markets, where prices are “right”, consumers’ choice should, with few exceptions, be limited only by their budget constraints. But in the case of agricultural products, the “right” prices are not in place. One reason is that producers in this sector do not bear the costs for the externalities they generate. Focusing on the case of the Baltic Sea, this brief provides some insights into why livestock producers are, by and large, exempted from environmental policies, and raises the question whether something should be done about it.
An Italian expression describes the attempt to juggle too many projects or attain too many goals at once, with the tacit implication that something is bound to fail. “Avere troppa carne al fuoco“: literally, to have too much meat on the grill. This, in a metaphorical but also quite literal sense, is the dominant impression left by some summer reading about the situation of the Baltic Sea.
The Baltic Sea is home to the world’s largest anthropogenic “dead zone”. The main culprit is the unsustainable livestock production in the region, generating externalities (i.e., costs that economic actors impose on others without paying a price for it) that short-circuit the functioning of the markets, creating a case for regulatory intervention. The concept of externalities is today most famously related to the issue of carbon dioxide emissions and climate change, felt by many as the most pressing challenge mankind has to deal with at present. In recent years, a lot of brain power has been spent on this, but there is more to environmental degradation and climate change than just CO2 and rising temperatures. A very conspicuous example is literally under our eyes, in the water body that lies between our lands. What should we do about it?
A Layman Understanding of the Background
For at least three decades, eutrophication (i.e., nutrient accumulation) and hypoxia (i.e., oxygen depletion) in the Baltic Sea has triggered and boosted each other in a vicious cycle. The nutrients discharged in the water fertilize the ocean floor resulting in an excess algal bloom. This underwater forest consumes oxygen, thus altering the balance between chemical elements in the water, so that even more nutrients are released and the cycle continues (for further references, see [16, 19, 21]). Beyond the algae and the decreased transparency of the water, these deep changes in the sea environment start to make them noticed in fish stocks depletion, but can more generally become devastating to both the marine and terrestrial ecosystems. Moreover, according to researchers, these conditions are going to increase the sensitivity of the area to the global climatic changes expected in the near future. This is seriously threatening a large part of economic activities in the whole catchment of the sea, an area of 22,500,000 km2 over nine countries with 85 million inhabitants.
Since 1974, all sources of pollution around the sea have been subject to a single convention, the Helsinki Convention, signed by the then seven Baltic coastal states. The Helsinki Commission, or HELCOM, is the governing body of the Convention, whose present Contracting Parties are Denmark, Estonia, the European Community, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Sweden. For over three decades, HELCOM has monitored the situation. Alarming reports have followed one upon the other, together with policy recommendations to the contracting parties.
As stated on its website, “the work of HELCOM has led to improvements in various fields, but further work is still needed [… and] the remaining challenges are more difficult than earlier obstacles”. Reductions in emissions achieved so far are low hanging fruits, concerning major point sources, such as larger cities’ sewage treatment plants and industrial wastewater outlets. Due to both technical and socio-economic obstacles, achieving further reductions will be a tougher task. This is because it is now time to address diffuse sources of nutrients such as run-off from over-fertilized agricultural lands. Nevertheless, according to numerous studies (among others, [19, 23]), a substantial reduction of the nutrient load discharged into the sea appears necessary in order to reduce further damage; all the more, so given that it takes many decades for the sea to recover. The question is hence whether more stringent policy instruments might be needed.
According to researchers at HELCOM, eutrophication of the Baltic Sea is due to the excess of nitrogen and phosphorus loads coming from land-based sources. About 75% of nitrogen and 52% of phosphorus come from agriculture and the livestock sector. In particular, the main reason for the sharp increase in nutrient loads during the last 50 years is the intensification and rationalization process. This was partly stimulated by the EU Common Agricultural Policy in its early phase, with a geographic separation between crop and animal production [6, 9, 10]. On the one hand, animal farms grew ever bigger, in the order of tens of thousands of animals for cattle, hundreds of thousands for swine and millions for chicken farms. These giant facilities produce way more manure than what could be absorbed by crop production in their vicinity. Cheap fodder to these extremely dense animal populations is produced on large scale crop fields elsewhere, too far away for transport of manure to be feasible and instead using high-yield chemical fertilizers. This way, the nutrient surplus is multiplied at both locations; it leaks through the ground or in the waterways from the big heaps of manure that cannot be properly stored or disposed of, and it leaks from the over-fertilized fields (shocking case studies are reported by HELCOM [11]).
However, a different type of agriculture exists in the area known as Ecological Recycling Agriculture (ERA). This is based on more traditional methods and means that farms have a lower animal density and use the manure as fertilizer in an integrated production of crop to be used for animal feed. In this way, ERA manages to better close the cycle of nutrients with very little dispersion to the environment. Scenarios simulations [12] show that, expanding the presence of ERA from the negligible shares it currently accounts for (between zero and a few percentage points, varying by sector and country) would contribute considerably to solving the problem. The nitrogen surplus discharged into the sea yearly could decrease by as much as 61% if all agricultural production in Poland and the Baltic states were converted to the standard of the best ERA facilities currently operating (the Swedish ones), without affecting the current volumes of crop and animal products. However, this is not likely to happen spontaneously, precisely because of the externalities discussed above. As long as the external costs are unaccounted for and ignored, scale economies push in the direction of concentration and intensification, which is the current development path of the sector.
A Difficult Question
Zooming out from the Baltic Sea and looking at the bigger picture, one starts to wonder why the agricultural sector is so seldom a part of environmental policy or even the debate. Recent research has raised awareness about the contribution of the agriculture and livestock sector to climate change [5, 8, 14, 17]. Beyond nitrogen and phosphorus, the expansion of livestock farming is behind the rising emissions of methane. It is the next most common greenhouse gas after CO2 and responsible for 19% of global warming from human activities. This is more than the share of all transportation in the world combined [18].
A new American Economic Review paper [13] provides a broad picture of the sources of air pollution in the American economy, for the first time computed separately by sector and industry, and with the purpose of incorporating externalities into national accounts. Crop production and livestock production stand out among the five industries with the largest gross external damage (GED), defined as the dollar value of emissions from sources within the industry. In fact, the agricultural sector has the highest GED to value added ratio.
However, greenhouse gases are not the only externality generated by livestock production. The animals’ living conditions under modern farming methods favor the emergence of infections and new diseases that reach much further than through direct consumption of related products, as the recent E. coli episode in Europe brought to attention. The generalized use of antibiotics in animal feed, legal and widespread in some countries [3], constitutes an even bigger health threat. This is because it has the potential of generating antibiotic-resistant mutations of bacteria against which we would be completely defenseless should they pass to humans.
Moreover, the public has from an animal-rights and ethics perspective become increasingly concerned about the animals’ living conditions. 77% of respondents to the Eurobarometer 2005 believe that the welfare-protection of farm animals in their country needs to be improved. 96% of American respondents to the Gallup 2003 survey say that animals deserve legal protection, and 76% say that animal welfare is more important than low meat prices. Additionally, a comparable share advocates passing strict laws concerning the treatment of farmed animals.
In rich countries, the increased share of meat in the diet, which has been stimulated by decreasing relative prices, constitutes according to some medical research a health hazard in itself. In developing countries, raising livestock is an inefficient and expensive converter of fossil fuels into calories for human consumption. In addition, fodder production often displaces other important land uses such as forests.
It is easy to rationalize the absence of these issues from the policy agenda. It is not just a matter of powerful lobbies. The ownership structure and size composition make the agricultural sector so heterogeneous that the challenges in regulating it can easily be imagined. Adding to this, is the special role of food in culture, the “local” products so often linked to national identity, the romantic idea of the land nourishing its people, and of course the strategic role of being food self-sufficient [7]. In the past, the latter was linked to wars and famines. Perhaps, even in our projections about the future, self-reliance in food production still plays an important role in the perspective of global climate changes and accordingly limited or modified trade flows. However, we cannot afford to grant this sector a special status and ignore all the social costs it generates. Can we learn anything from current research on how all these externalities should be addressed?
Policy Tools
In the terminology of Baumol and Oates’ classic book on environmental policy, instruments can be categorized as “command and control”. For example, explicit regulation of standards and technologies with associated prohibitions and sanctions; information provision, that then lets the power in the hands of the consumers; and price-based instruments, in the form of taxes, subsidies or trading schemes. These can be imposed on inputs or output, with different implications [4].
The relatively high-level standards of EU environmental legislation (legally stipulated maximum livestock density per hectare, requirements of minimum manure storage capacity, ban on winter manure spreading) is effectively enforced in some countries. In the newer members states, on the other hand, issues have been reported [15] in the form of incomplete translation of EU legislation into the national regulations and ineffective enforcing, significant examples of unlawful practices by foreign companies (e.g. Danish companies in Poland and Lithuania) and limited public access to environmental information. When it comes to non-EU members in the Baltic Sea area, these problems are scaled up, with very large animal farms, lack of many important environmental regulations (no limits on livestock density, capacity of manure storage or ammonia emissions from stored and utilized manure, too generous limits for amount of manure allowed, etc.) and an insufficient environmental information system.
Information undoubtedly plays an important role, but to rely on consumers’ pressure might not be sufficient to solve this type of issues. Consumers are not famously a very effective pressure group, because of organizational issues and the classic collective action problems. Direct regulation of activities is certainly necessary, especially when it comes to the most important rules of the game for producers. However, the heterogeneity of the sector creates a trade-off between environmental precision and transaction costs of implementation and control in practice. For example, the damage of nitrate leaching depends on the type of soil; the policy measure is precise when it restricts leaching losses on sites that have specific characteristics. However, the costs of enforcing measures only at these sites are high. Alternatively, curbing nitrate use in general has low transaction cost, but because it will also affect sites without problems of nitrate in the groundwater, it also has low precision. This may be considered unfair or illegitimate [24].
Another limit of this approach is the lack of flexibility: once a particular practice becomes forbidden, it is likely that some other behavior emerges from the creativity of the actors involved that was not foreseen by the norm but could potentially present the same problems as the forbidden one. This will happen as long as the private incentives of the actors are not aligned with the policy goal.
Often the best way to curb a particular activity that, as in this case, has a number of unwanted side effects, is not to ban it but to put a price on it. As in the case made for CO2, a market based approach could also in this area offer the advantage of being cost-effective and at the same time stimulate creative new solutions, e.g. new technologies for manure processing. Therefore, one immediate questions concerns why the agriculture sector is not included in the European emission trading scheme (ETS)?
The European Union launched already in 2005 its version of a cap and trade scheme, covering some 11,000 power stations and industrial plants in 30 countries. As from 2013, the scope of the European ETS will be extended to include more sectors such as aviation, but not agriculture or livestock. The main limitation of ETS is that it does not address spatial concentration problems. When emissions have an immediate effect on the local environment, permit trading does not guarantee the achievement of targets at each location. On the contrary, the possibility of trading emission permits combined with economies of scale might lead to the emergence of emission hotspots, sites with highly concentrated amounts of pollutants locally affecting the environment and the population. A proposed variation is a scheme for tradable concentration permits, either for manure [20] or for animal production [2]. A concentration permit is defined as the permission to deposit a quantity of pollutants at a specific location. The permits can then enter a trading system, but the use of the right remains linked to the site. Some authors believe that in practice, such systems generate high transaction costs and cannot achieve cost-effectiveness.
An input tax, for example on chemical fertilizers or imported fodder, or a direct tax on emissions would only affect the balance between domestic production and imports from countries that do not have the same regulation. Moreover, as discussed above, emissions are far from being the only problem. An alternative, as argued by Wirsenius, Hedenus and Mohlin at the Chalmers University of Technology and University of Gothenburg [22] is an output tax, i.e. a tax on meat consumption, on the grounds that costs of monitoring emissions are high, there are limited options for reducing emissions apart from output reduction, and the possibility for output substitution in the consumption basket are substantial. Moreover, a tax on consumption would avoid international competition from products that are not produced with the same standards.
A meat tax has shortly appeared in the public debate, for example in the Netherlands and in Sweden, but it has failed to gain much popularity so far. Meat consumption in the area has increased considerably in recent years –between 30% in Germany and 160% in Denmark since 1960 – and relative prices have fallen. By a combination of price and income effects, it has become a norm to eat meat every day, or even at every meal. It must be recognized, though, that while each single policy instrument discussed above has its shortcomings, because of the many interrelated aspects of the problem, a reduction in output, perhaps through a consumption tax, would address in a more comprehensive way all the different externalities related to meat production. After all, maybe there is just too much meat on our grills.
Recommended Further Readings
- [1] ”Slaktkropparnas kvalitet i ekologisk uppfödning”. Technical report, Ekokött, 2006.
- [2] J. Alkan-Olsson. Sustainable Water Management: Organization, Participation, Influence, Economy., volume 5, chapter Alternative economic instruments of control. VASTRA, Gothenburg University, 2004.
- [3] Mary D. Barton. “Antibiotic use in animal feed and its impact on human health”. Nutrition Research Reviews, 13:279–299, 2000.
- [4] W.J. Baumol and W.E. Oates. The theory of environmental policy. Cambridge Univ Pr, 1988.
- [5] J. Bellarby, B. Foereid, and A. Hastings. Cool Farming: Climate impacts of agriculture and mitigation potential. Greenpeace International, 2008.
- [6] M. Brandt and H. Ejhed. Trk transport-retention-källfördelning. Belastning på havet. Naturvårdsverket Rapport, 5247, 2002.
- [7] F. Braudel, S. Reynolds, and S. Reynolds. The structures of everyday life: The limits of the possible. Harper & Row, Publ., 1981.
- [8] A. Golub, B. Henderson, and T. Hertel. Ghg mitigation policies in livestock sectors: Competitiveness, emission leakage and food security. In Agricultural and Applied Economics Association 2011 Annual Meeting, July 24-26, 2011, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, 2011.
- [9] A. Granstedt. Increasing the efficiency of plant nutrient recycling within the agricultural system as a way of reducing the load to the environment–experience from Sweden and Finland. Agriculture, ecosystems & environment, 80(1-2):169–185, 2000.
- [10] A. Granstedt and M. Larsson. “Sustainable governance of the agriculture and the Baltic Sea – agricultural reforms”, food production and curbed eutrophication. Ecological Economics, 69:1943–1951, 2010.
- [11] HELCOM. “Balthazar project 2009-2010: Reducing nutrient loading from large scale animal farming in Russia”. Technical report, 2010.
- [12] M. Larsson and A. Granstedt. “Sustainable governance of the agriculture and the Baltic Sea–agricultural reforms, food production and curbed eutrophication”. Ecological Economics, 69(10):1943–1951, 2010.
- [13] Nicholas Z. Muller, Robert Mendelsohn, and William Nordhaus. “Environmental accounting for pollution in the United States economy”. American Economic Review, 101:1649–1675, 2011.
- [14] T. Nauclér and P.A. Enkvist. “Pathways to a low-carbon economy: Version 2 of the global greenhouse gas abatement cost curve”. McKinsey & Company, pages 26–31, 2009.
- [15] J. Skorupski. “Report on industrial swine and cattle farming in the Baltic Sea catchment area”. Technical report, Coalition Clean Baltic, 2006.
- [16] B. Smith, A. Aasa, R. Ahas, T. Blenckner, T.V. Callaghan, J. Chazal, C. Humborg, A.M. Jönsson, S. Kellomäki, A. Kull, et al. “Climate-related change in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems”. Assessment of Climate Change for the Baltic Sea Basin, pages 221–308, 2008.
- [17] P. Smith, D. Martino, Z. Cai, D. Gwary, H. Janzen, P. Kumar, B. McCarl, S. Ogle, F. OMara, C. Rice, et al. “Greenhouse gas mitigation in agriculture”. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, Series B: Biological Sciences, 363(1492):789–813, 2008.
- [18] H. Steinfeld, P. Gerber, T. Wassenaar, V. Castel, M. Rosales, and C. de Haan. “Livestock’s long shadow: environmental issues and options”. 2006.
- [19] E. Vahtera, D.J. Conley, B.G. Gustafsson, H. Kuosa, H. Pitkänen, O.P. Savchuk, T. Tamminen, M. Viitasalo, M. Voss, N. Wasmund, et al. “Internal ecosystem feedbacks enhance nitrogen-fixing cyanobacteria blooms and complicate management in the Baltic Sea”. AMBIO: A journal of the Human Environment, 36(2):186–194, 2007.
- [20] B. Van der Straeten, J. Buysse, S. Nolte, L. Lauwers, D. Claeys, and G. Van Huylenbroeck. “Markets of concentration permits: The case of manure policy”. Ecological Economics, 2011.
- [21] H. von Storch and A. Omstedt. “The BALTEX Assessment of Climate Change for the Baltic Sea basin, chapter Introduction and summary”. Berlin, Germany: Springer., 2008.
- [22] S. Wirsenius, F. Hedenus, and K. Mohlin. “Greenhouse gas taxes on animal food products: rationale, tax scheme and climate mitigation effects”. Climatic Change, pages 1–26, 2010.
- [23] F. Wulff, O.P. Savchuk, A. Sokolov, C. Humborg, and C.M. Mörth. “Management options and effects on a marine ecosystem: assessing the future of the Baltic”. AMBIO: A Journal of the Human Environment, 36(2):243–249, 2007.
- [24] O. Oenema. “Governmental policies and measures regulating nitrogen and phosphorus from animal manure in European agriculture”. Journal of Animal Science, 2004.
Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.
The Bleak Economic Future of Russia (audio test)

Is the Russian economy “surprisingly resilient” to sanctions and actions of the West? The short answer is no. On the contrary, the impact on Russian growth is already very clear while the economic downturn in the EU is small. The main effects from the sanctions are yet to be realized, and the coming sanctions will be even more consequential for the Russian economy. The biggest impacts are however those in the longer run, beyond the sanctions. Mr. Putin’s actions have led to a fundamental shift in the perception of Russia as a market for doing business. The West and especially EU countries are on a track of divesting their economic ties to Russia (in particular in, but not only, energy markets) and the country is simultaneously losing significant shares of its human capital. All these effects mean that the long-term economic outlook for Russia is not just a business cycle type recession but a lasting downward shift.
Introduction
The global economic outlook at the moment seems rather bleak. According to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) most recent World Economic Outlook, global growth is expected to slow from above 6 percent in 2021, to 3.2 percent this year, and 2.7 percent in 2023. For the US and the Euro area the corresponding numbers are slightly above a 5 percent growth in 2021, between 2 and 3 percent in 2022, while barely reaching 1 percent in 2023. At the same time inflation is up and central banks are trying to curb this by raising interest rates.
From an EU perspective it is an open question what proportion of the lower growth is caused by the economic consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Certainly, energy prices are affected as well as issues relating to natural resources and agricultural products (though the consequences of shortages in these goods are far larger for Middle Eastern, North African and Sub-Saharan countries). But it is not the case that all of the economic problems in the EU are due to the changed economic relations with Russia.
In assessing the economic impact of Russia’s war, and in particular the impact of sanctions, it is important to focus on both expectations as well as proportions. A widespread narrative portrays Russia’s relative economic resilience (compared to the expectations of some in March/ April 2022) as the Russian economy being surprisingly unaffected, while the EU is depicted as being badly hit, especially by high energy prices. In a European context, the Swedish daily newspaper Dagens Nyheter claims that “experts are surprised over Russia’s resilience” and the Economist, a British weekly newspaper, recently portrayed recession prospects for Europe as “Russia climbs out”. We argue that such point of view is misleading. To get a more balanced image of what is unfolding it is important to think both about the expected consequences of sanctions, including how long some of them take to have an effect, but also (and maybe most important when thinking about the long run), what economic consequences are now unfolding beyond the impact of sanctions.
Sanctions Against Russia
Let us start with what sanctions are in place, what types of impact these have had so far and what can be expected in the future. There are three types of sanctions currently in place. First, and most impactful in the short run, are limitations on financial transactions, especially those imposed on the Central Bank. In this category there are also the restrictions on other Russian banks disconnecting them from a key part of the global payment system, SWIFT, as well as measures targeting other assets: divestments from funds, investment withdrawals, asset freezes, and other impediments to financial flows. The main short-term aim of these actions was to reduce the Russian government’s alternatives to finance the army and their military operations. Second there are sanctions on trade in goods and services. At the moment these target particularly technology imports and energy and metals exports. These take a longer time to be felt and are potentially more costly to the sanctioning countries as well. They also contribute, in principle, to reduced resources for war. Besides affecting the government’s budget, both financial and trade sanctions disturb ordinary people’s lives as well and might create discontent and protests. A third group of sanctions are so-called sanctions of inconvenience such as limitations to air traffic, closure of air space, exclusion form sport and cultural events, restrictions of movement for both officials and tourists, and others, which aim at disconnecting the target country from the rest of the world. These are partly symbolic in nature, but can also impact popular opinion, including among the elites. However, a potential problem is that such sanctions can push opinion in either of two opposite directions: against the target regime in sympathy with the sanctioning parties; or against what is now perceived as an external enemy in a so-called rally-around-the-flag effect.
Along these dimensions the sanctions have so far had mixed effects in relation to the objectives listed above. We will return to this issue below, but in short, the sanctions on the Central Bank and the financial system, albeit powerful, fell short of causing anything like a collapse of the Russian financial system. Some of the trade restrictions, together with other global economic events, created an environment where lost trade volumes for Russia were compensated by price increases in resources and energy exports. When it comes to restrictions on imports of many high-tech components, these are certainly being felt in the Russian economy although still not fully. Public perceptions in Russia are hard to judge from the outside, especially given the problems of voiced opposition in the country, while public perceptions in sanctioning countries have mainly been favorable as people want to see that their governments are “doing something”.
What Do We Know About Sanctions in General?
A key question when judging whether sanctions “work” is to study what a reasonable benchmark can be. As discussed in a previous FREE Policy Brief (2012), sanctions don’t enjoy a reputation of being very effective. This is true both in the research literature as well as in the public opinion. There are reasons for this that have to do with both how “effectiveness” is intended and the limits that empirical enquiries necessarily face in trying to answer the question of effectiveness. This does not mean, however, that sanctions have no effect. Another FREE Policy Brief (2022) summarizes a selection of the most credible research in this area. In short, a majority of studies find that sanctions affect the population in target countries through shortages of various kind (food, clean water, medicine and healthcare), resulting in lower life expectancy and increased infant mortality. The types of effects are comparable to the consequences of a military conflict. In the cases where it has been possible to credibly quantify the damage to GDP, estimates are in the range of 2 to 4 percent of reduced annual growth over a fairly long period (10 years on average and up to 3 years after the lifting of sanctions). One has to keep in mind that lower growth rates compound over time, so that the total loss at the end of an average period is quite substantial. As a comparison, the latest estimate of the total loss in global GDP from the Covid-19 crisis stands at “just” -3.4 percent. Other studies find similarly significant negative effects on other economic outcomes such as employment rate, international trade, public expenditure, the value of the country’s currency, and inequality. There is of course variation in the effects depending on the type of sanctions and also on the structure of the target economy. Trade sanctions tend to have a negative effect both in the short and long run, while smart sanctions (i.e. sanctions targeting specific individuals or groups) may even have positive effects on the target country’s economy in the long run.
Sanctions and the Current State of the Russian Economy
When it comes to the Russian economy’s performance in these dire straits, the very bleak forecasts from spring 2022 have since been partly revised upwards. Some are surprised that the collective West has not been able to deliver a “knock-out blow” to the Russian economy. In light of what we know about sanctions in general this is perhaps not very surprising. Also, one can recall that even a totally isolated Soviet economy held up for quite some time. This however does not mean that sanctions are not working. There are several explanations for this. As already mentioned, some of the restrictions imply by their very nature some time delay; large countries normally have stocks and reserves of many goods – and on top of this Mr. Putin had been preparing for a while. Also, the undecisive and delayed management of energy trade from the EU reduced the effectiveness of other measures, in particular the impact of financial restrictions. Continued trade in the most valuable resources for the Russian government together with spikes in prices (partly due to the fact that the embargo was announced several months ahead of the intended implementation) flooded the Russian state coffers. This effect was also enlarged by the domestic tax cuts on gasoline prices in many European countries in response to a higher oil price (Gars, Spiro and Wachtmeister, 2022). This is soon coming to an end, but at the moment Russia enjoys the world’s second largest current account surplus.
The phenomenal adaptability of the global economy is also playing in Russia’s favor: banned from Western markets, Russia is finding new suppliers for at least some imports. However, although they are dampening and slowing the blow at the moment, it is difficult to envision how these countries can be substitutes for Western trade partners for many years to come.
The Russian Economy Beyond Sanctions
Given all of this, the impact on the Russian economy is not nearly as small as some commentators claim. Starting with GDP, an earlier FREE Policy Brief (2016) shows how surprisingly well Russia’s GDP growth can be explained by changes in international oil prices. This is true for the most recent period as well, up until the turn of the year 2021-2022 and the start of hostilities, as shown in Figure 1. Besides the clear seasonal pattern, Russian GDP (in Rubles) closely follows the BRENT oil price. This simple model, which performs very well in explaining the GDP series historically, generates a predicted development as shown by the red dotted line. Comparing this with the figures provided by the Russian Federal State Statistics Service, Rosstat, for the first two quarters of 2022 (which might in themselves be exaggeratedly positive) indicates a loss by at least 8 percent in the first and further 9 percent in the second quarter. In other words, GDP predicted by this admittedly simple model would have been 19 percent higher than what reported by Rosstat in the first half of 2022. As a comparison, Saudi Arabia – another highly oil dependent country – saw its fastest growth in a decade during the second quarter, up by almost 12 percent.
Figure 1. Russian GDP against predictions

Source: Authors’ calculations on GDP in rubles based on figures from Rosstat and the BRENT oil price series. Note that GDP is denominated in Rubles to avoid confusion due to the USD/Rubles exchange rates being volatile (given the lack of trade post invasion) and thus hard to interpret.
Other indicators point in the same direction. According to a report published by researchers at Yale University in July this year, Russian imports, on which all sectors and industries in the economy are dependent, fell by no less than ~50 percent; consumer spending and retail sales both plunged by at least ~20 percent; sales of foreign cars – an important indicator of business cycle – plummeted by 95 percent. Further, domestic production levels show no trace of the effort towards import substitution, a key ingredient in Mr. Putin’s proposed “solution” to the sanctions problem.
Longer Term Trends
There are many reasons to be concerned with the short run impact from sanctions on the Russian economy. Internally in Russia it matters for the public opinion, especially in parts that do not have access to reports about what goes on in the war. Economic growth has always been important for Putin’s popularity during peace time (Becker, 2019a). In Europe it matters mainly because a key objective is to make financing the war as difficult as possible, but also to ensure public support for Ukraine. A perception among Europeans that the Russian economy is doing fine despite sanctions is likely to decrease the support for these measures. However, the more important economic consequences for Russia are the long-run effects. Many large multinational firms have left and started to divest from the country. There has always been a risk premium attached to doing business in Russia, which showed up particularly in terms of reduced investment after the annexation of Crimea in 2014 (Becker, 2019b). But for a long time hopes of a gradual shift and a large market potential kept companies involved in Russia (in some time periods more, in others less). This has however ended for the foreseeable future. Many of the large companies that have left the Russian market are unlikely to return even in the medium term, regardless of what happens to sanctions. Similarly, investments into Russia have been seen as a crucial determinant of its growth and wellbeing (Becker and Olofsgård, 2017), and now this momentum is completely lost.
Energy relations have been Russia’s main leverage against the EU although warnings about this dependency have been raised for a long time. In this relationship, there has also been a hope that Russia would feel a mutual dependence and that over time it would shift its less desirable political course. With the events over the past year, this balancing act has decidedly come to an end, if not permanent, at least for many years to come. The EU will do its utmost not to rely on Russian energy in the future, and regardless of what path it chooses – LNG, more nuclear power, more electricity storage, etc. – the path forward will be to move away from Russia. Of course, there are other markets – approximately 40 percent of global GDP lies outside of the sanctioning countries – so clearly there are alternatives both for selling resources and establishing new trade relationships. However, this will in many cases take a lot of time and require very large infrastructure investments. And perhaps more important, for the most (to Russia) valuable imports in the high-tech sector it will take a very long time before other countries can replace the firms that have now pulled out.
Yet another factor that will have long-term consequences is that many of these aspects are understood by large parts of the Russian population, and those with good prospects in the West have already left or are trying to do so. It has been a long-term goal for those wanting to reform the Russian economy, at least in the past 20 years, to attract and put to fruition the high potential that have been available in terms of human capital and scientific knowledge. However, these attempts have not succeeded and the recent developments have put a permanent end to those dreams.
Conclusion
In the latest IMF forecast, countries in the Euro area will grow by 3.1 percent this year and only 0.5 percent in 2023. In January the corresponding numbers stood at 3.9 percent and 2.5 percent. This drop, caused in large part by the altered relations with Russia, is certainly non negligible, and especially painful coming on the heels of the Covid-19 crisis. However, it is an order of magnitude smaller than the “missed growth” Russia is experiencing. When judging the impact from sanctions on the Russian economy overall, the correct (and historically consistent) counterfactual displays a sizable GDP growth driven by very high energy and commodity prices. Relative to such counterfactual, the sanctions effect is already very noticeable. In the coming months, economic activity will slow down and many European household will feel the consequences. In this climate it will be important that, when assessing the situation with Russia perhaps performing better than expected, the following is kept in mind. Firstly, Russia is still doing much worse compared to the EU as well as to other oil-producing countries. Secondly, and even more important, what matters are the longer run prospects. And these are certainly even worse for the Russian economy.
References
- Becker, T. (2019a). Economic growth and Putin’s Approval Ratings – The Return of the Fridge https://freepolicybriefs.org/2019/02/25/economic-growth-and-putins-approval-ratings-the-return-of-the-fridge/ FREE Policy Brief
- Becker, T. (2019b). Russia’s Real Cost of Crimean Uncertainty https://freepolicybriefs.org/2019/06/10/russias-real-cost-of-crimean-uncertainty/FREE Policy Brief
- Becker, T. and Olofsgård, A. (2017). From abnormal to normal – Two tales of growth from 25 years of transition, SITE Working paper 43, September.
- Becker, T. (2016). Russia and Oil – Out of Control https://freepolicybriefs.org/2016/10/31/russia-oil-control FREE Policy Brief
- Gars, J., Spiro, D. and Wachtmeister, H. (2022). The effect of European fuel-tax cuts on the oil income of Russia. Nat Energy 7, pp. 989-997 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-022-01122-6
- Perotta Berlin, M. (2022). The Effect of Sanctions https://freepolicybriefs.org/2022/05/10/effects-economic-sanctions/ FREE Policy Brief
- Perotta Berlin, M. (2012). Do Economic Sanctions Work? https://freepolicybriefs.org/2012/03/19/do-economic-sanctions-work/ FREE Policy Brief
- Sonnenfeld, J., Tian, S., Sokolowski, F., Wyrebkowski, M. and Kasprowicz, M. (2022). Business Retreats and Sanctions Are Crippling the Russian Economy. http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4167193
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