Factors related to municipal costs of waste collection service in Spain

Abstract

Actual cost of services of local entities (CESEL, in Spanish) is the name of a new official source of statistics in Spain, provided by Ministry of Finance and Civil Service, which intends to bring some transparency to a very obscure question: the real costs of local public services, in this case, the collection costs of municipal solid waste (MSW). The study analyzes the factors that determine solid waste collection costs in 2014, using a cross-sectional dataset of municipalities of the Spanish Mediterranean Arch and Madrid, with special reference to urban development. The results of the regression reveal a positive relation between waste collection costs and factors such as higher wages, coastal municipalities, tourist areas, population and separated collection; in contrast, the increase in urban population density contributes to lower costs of MSW collection, as well as indirect management of the service is cheaper than direct public delivery.