The public price control trap: the example of energy inputs

ABSTRACT The paper argues that in controlling public prices government gets into a trap: this control does not reduce inflation as expect in the first moment and activates factors that will increase it later on. The analysis is developed for government administered prices in the area of energy and employs an input-output model that takes into account the direct and indirect impacts of price changes. When public prices are reduced, the impact on the inflation is small; but, since this create financial difficulties for the public companies, they will either demand government resources and/or price appreciation later on. These will act through price expectations to increase inflation more than proportionally in the future.