Modal Estimates of Services Barriers

This paper presents improved approaches to measurement of services barriers by using alternative weighting methods and improved econometric specifications; the data include barriers affecting each mode of services supply and additional sector-specific regulatory variables. We provide an illustration of these improvements for banking, insurance, telecom (fixed and mobile), professional (engineering) and distribution services in selected countries in Africa, Asia, Central and Eastern Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. We report sector-specific restrictiveness indices at aggregate and modal levels along with aggregate and modal tax equivalents. We also provide confidence intervals for each estimated tax equivalent to take into account the limitations in the estimation techniques. Indeed these limitations lead us to argue against a strict interpretation of the empirical results and in favor of a more flexible, qualitative interpretation, combined with rank ordering of countries for indicative purposes.