El rol de los servicios públicos y privados en las economías europeas

Abstract

This PhD thesis represents an applied economic analysis of the role played by public and private services in European economies. The relevance of the argument is shown by the dominance of service activities in modern economies along with a recently renewed interest in this topic and by the need to adopt a comparative approach that goes beyond existing dichotomies in the study of these services. The ultimate goal of the research is to understand the macro and meso picture of public and private services in enlarged European Union (EU): their interactions, synergies and complementarities; their similarities and dissimilarities across countries; the explanatory factors of their growth and the diverse impacts they may have on economic growth and welfare. Several research questions are addressed: what is the role of tertiarization in modern economies? What is the nature of public and private services? What is the configuration of service economies across the enlarged EU? Do growth explanatory factors differ between public and private services? What is their contribution to growth and welfare? Different empirical methods of analysis are applied along with the study of the relevant literature on the different arguments treated: exploratory data analysis, multivariate clustering techniques, econometric tools such as panel data regressions and the construction of composite indicators. This thesis is an investigation of both private and public services using a comprehensive approach. It proves that across the enlarged EU, the dominant trend is towards increased levels of participation of private services in total employment, although a diverse map of service economies in close correlation with social and institutional models can also be found. Moreover, the variety of service economies in the EU can be explained on the basis of the different roles played by factors such as the state, social changes, labour market institutions and previous developments in the evolution of public, private and mixed services. Furthermore, although private and public services have made a significant contribution to the aggregated growth of the EU in recent years, their impact should also be assessed using a multidimensional approach which takes into account outcomes and quality aspects.