Main Street Economy Recent Projects

Socio-economic Surveys

Main Street Economics and its principal, Robert Wieland, have undertaken surveys including:

Main Street Economics has been able, when supplied with clear terms of reference, to develop survey instruments that obtain required information in efficient and cost effective ways. We can establish sampling frames and train enumerators. Whether data results are to be used as spreadsheets or as databases, Main Street Economics is able to produce digital copy of survey results for analysis. And, finally, the Company has a clear track-record in generating accurate and useful analyses and reporting of survey results.

Welfare-based Policy Analysis

Welfare-based policy analysis examines economic gains and losses implied by change, market imperfections or by public interventions in markets. In resource markets, market imperfections typically derive from maladaptive property rights and unassigned costs in resource use or production. Main Street Economics is able to apply economic welfare analysis to assess these imperfections and to evaluate policy options for addressing them.

In a recent study of forestland retention in Maryland, Main Street Economics undertook a review of state, federal and local government policies and programs aimed at keeping land in forest uses. This review considered objectives, administrative and economic costs of policies and programs, and compared these with benefits accruing to their implementation. In another application of welfare analysis of public policies, Robert Wieland undertook a review of environmental regulations and programs as a part of an industrial sector policy review in Sri Lanka for the Asian Development Bank.

In developing countries, policies and programs typically target accelerated economic development. Main Street Economics has undertaken numerous project appraisals and evaluations, assessing the likely and ultimate returns to investments in programs and institutions that pursue those objectives. Much of this work has focused on financial institutions serving targeted clienteles, the provision of economic infrastructure (especially roads), and programs targeting an enabling environment for small businesses.

Measures of Non-Market Costs and Benefits

A common problem in resource and public health markets is that some costs or benefits go unaccounted by the market. This can lead to economic losses and market inefficiencies. Examples include air and water pollution, excessive fishing effort in fisheries, and the retention of farm and forestland in those uses. In the summer of 2004, Main Street Economics is undertaking an analysis of commercial and non-market environmental costs of sub-optimal management of the oyster fishery in the Chesapeake Bay. Robert Wieland’s book, “Why People Catch Too Many Fish”, addressed the fundamentals of the common property problem in open-access fisheries. In 2002 and 2003, Main Street Economics incorporated non-market values for forestland in Maryland into the analysis of policies aimed at supporting the State’s forest resource base. In his assessment of environmental regulations and policies in Sri Lanka, Robert Wieland addressed both the non-market health and environmental costs of industrial production and the regulatory compliance, monitoring and enforcement costs of existing policies.

In addition to unaccounted costs in resource markets, some economies are burdened by market inefficiencies imposed by government policies and regulations. These policies and regulations can undermine private sector development by discouraging enterprises from operating at all or by forcing them into an “informal-sector” that limits their ability to supply goods and services. In Jamaica, Robert Wieland developed a matrix of regulatory compliance costs and the distribution of enterprises’ by levels of profit. This matrix showed that most firms could not, at their existing levels of income, afford to comply with regulations. Mr. Wieland also reported on informal financial markets in the developing countries for the World Bank’s “World Development Report, 1989”.

Other Environmental and Natural Resource Analysis

In 2002, in anticipation of problems achieving restoration goals for the Chesapeake Bay, the EPA undertook a demonstration “Use Attainability Analysis”. The purpose of this Use Attainability Analysis was to show the states with legal jurisdiction over the Chesapeake Bay how to undertake their own analyses. As a member of the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Use Attainability Workgroup, Robert Wieland helped to demonstrate the fundamental need for cost efficiency in any assessment of the costs implied by various levels of water quality restoration. Because there is no single budget constraint spanning all of the water quality restoration efforts, incentives for cost minimization are limited. Further, because technical efficiencies for various restoration practices are poorly known, the possibility that administrative solutions could overcome this problem is also limited.

In 2004, Main Street Economics analyzed the private timber resource implications of various management strategies for pine forests on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. In this study, several forest growth models were used to estimate production under each of nine different scenarios. Using historical cost and price data and the results of these simulations, a net present value of timber production was developed for each scenario.

In 2003 – 2004, Main Street Economics estimated the net present value of oyster stocks in the Chesapeake Bay with respect to their role in removing nitrogen and phosphorus from the water column. This work supported research undertaken by oyster scientists at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science.