Financial Privacy An International Comparison of Credit Reporting Systems [Hardcover]

In this updated edition, author Nicola Jentzsch provides an in-depth analysis of the economics and regulation of financial privacy. You get a comparative overview of credit reporting systems in the US and in the 27 member states of the European Union. This is the most in-depth study of the history and economics of credit reporting to date, according to David Medine, former Associate Director of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.

Credit reporting agencies collect and compile highly sensitive information on the millions of consumers in credit markets throughout the world and also increasingly across a variety of industries, such as insurance, retail and telecommunications. In this revised edition, Nicola Jentzsch provides an in-depth analysis of the economics and regulation of financial privacy and a comparative overview of credit reporting systems in the US and the 27 member states of the European Union. She offers an authoritative evaluation of the design and functioning of dual systems consisting of public credit registers and private credit reporting agencies. Drawing on theories of information and privacy as well as competition in information markets, she discusses the history and institutions of credit reporting. Finally, on an empirical level, the book assesses the economic effects of credit reporting on credit markets.

This book provides the first in-depth analysis of the economics and regulation of financial privacy. It is an international comparison of credit reporting systems in the United States and in European countries. On the theoretical level the book explains competition in information markets, especially in markets for goods made of highly personal and sensitive information. It reviews the microeconomics of information and privacy and discusses theló–