TY  - JOUR
AU  - Grainger,Corbett A.
AU  - Costello,Christopher
TI  - The Value of Secure Property Rights: Evidence from Global Fisheries
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 17019
PY  - 2011
Y2  - May 2011
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w17019
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w17019.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Corbett A. Grainger
Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics
University of Wisconsin, Madison
429 Taylor Hall
427 Lorch St.
Madison, WI 53706
http://www.aae.wisc.edu/cagrainger
Tel: 608-262-3651
E-Mail: cagrainger@wisc.edu

Christopher Costello
Bren School of Environmental
Science & Management
University of California, Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, CA 93106
Tel: 805/893-5802
Fax: 805/893-7612
E-Mail: costello@bren.ucsb.edu
AB  - Property rights are commonly touted as a solution to common pool resource problems. But in practice the security of these property rights varies substantially owing to differences in design. In fisheries, the design of individual transferable quotas (ITQs) varies widely; the consequences of these design differences on economic outcomes has not been studied. To test whether the security of these property rights affects asset values, we compile a unique dataset to examine the relationship between the exclusivity of property rights and the dividend price ratios for ITQs. We find evidence that stronger property rights lead to higher asset values and lower dividend price ratios in ITQ fisheries. This pecuniary effect of property rights security informs the current policy debate on the design of property rights institutions for managing natural resources.
ER  -