Credit reporting agencies collect and compile highly-sensitive information on 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 in credit markets.
Introduction 1
2 Theory of Information and Privacy 7
2.1 Competition in Information Markets 8
2.2 Markets for Personal Information 26
2.3 Microeconomics of Information 42
3 Overview of Credit Reporting Systems 61
3.1 History of Credit Reporting Agencies 62
3.2 Design of Credit Reporting Systems 110
4 Regulation of Credit Reporting 119
4.1 International Data Protection Overview 119
4.2 The Regulatory Regime in the U.S 122
4.3 Regulatory Regimes in Europe 135
5 Economic Effects of Credit Reporting 173
5.1 Credit Scoring 173
5.2 Empirical Evidence on Data Protection 180
5.3 Estimating the Effects of Data Protection 204
5.4 Evidence on Information Inaccuracies 228
6 Conclusions 249
References 253
Glossary of Credit Terms 273