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on Efficiency and Productivity |
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Issue of 2022‒08‒22
fourteen papers chosen by |
| By: | Lambert, Lixia H.; Shear, Hannah Elizabeth; Warren, Jason |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Resource/Energy Economics and Policy, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2022–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea22:322227&r= |
| By: | Paskynel Jacques-Arvisais; Simon Lapointe |
| Abstract: | This study examines the relationship between transportation infrastructure and output and productivity in Canada. We estimate different specifications of a static Cobb-Douglas production function (in levels and in differences). The impact of highway infrastructure is mixed. For the 1997-2018 period a higher stock of highways does not translate into higher productivity for the business sector, But from 2009 to 2018, the impact of highways is positive and statistically significant, when we account for province-specific characteristics. The long run elasticity of output with respect to railway lines is statistically significant and quite large (0.27). For this type of infrastructure, then, our results are more conclusive and point to a positive impact of railways on output and productivity. |
| Keywords: | transportation infrastructure, output, productivity, Canada |
| Date: | 2022–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sls:resrep:1926&r= |
| By: | Alina Wilke (Europäisches Institut für Internationale Wirtschaftsbeziehungen (EIIW)); Paul J. J. Welfens (Europäisches Institut für Internationale Wirtschaftsbeziehungen (EIIW)) |
| Abstract: | This paper considers labor productivity growth under the Corona pandemic setting in Germany in 2020 and the first two quarters of 2021 and thus is a complementary analysis to a study of Vries et al. (2021) which covers the US, France and the UK. Data from 63 industries is used within a shift-share analysis to analyze pure within-productivity growth in Germany, abstracting from reallocations of hours worked. Following the original approach of Vries et al. (2021), three taxonomies are applied to categorize industry-level data regarding similar types of activity (sector affiliation), working-from-home (WFH) intensity and digital intensity. We find that aggregate productivity growth in Germany was slightly negative in 2020, but saw a rather large positive growth in the second quarter of 2021. This is still true when looking at the pure-within industry productivity growth. The much-discussed hospitality and culture sector underwent only small within-productivity growth reductions. Most changes of within-productivity growth during 2020 and 2021 can be observed in the manufacturing sector. Even though high WFH industries performed better during 2020 in terms of within-industry productivity growth, the difference to medium- and low-WFH industries was very small. In the second quarter of 2021 both medium and low WFH industries outperformed high WFH industries. Above average digital-intensive industries showed higher within-industry productivity growth than below average digital-intensive industries at the beginning of the pandemic. However, below average digital-intensive industries caught up during the first two quarters of 2021. For almost all industries, rather large within-industry productivity growth can be observed in the second quarter of 2021. |
| Keywords: | Productivity, Covid-19 pandemic, labor reallocation, digitalization, work-from-home, shift-share analysis |
| JEL: | D24 E23 O47 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bwu:eiiwdp:disbei313&r= |
| By: | Michael Koch (Department of Economics and Business Economics, FIND - Research Centre for Firms and Industry Dynamics, Aarhus University); Ilya Manuylov (Department of Economics and Business Economics, FIND - Research Centre for Firms and Industry Dynamics, Aarhus University) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the technological bias of robot adoption using a rich panel data set of Spanish manufacturing firms over a 25-year period. We apply the production function estimation when productivity is multidimensional to the case of an automating technology, to reveal the Hicks-neutral and labor-augmenting technological change brought about by robot adoption within firms. Our results indicate a causal effect of robots on Hicks-neutral and labor-augmenting components of productivity. The biased technological change turns out to be an important determinant of the decline in the aggregate share of labor in the Spanish manufacturing sector. |
| Keywords: | Robots, Automation, Technological change, Productivity, Labor share |
| JEL: | O33 J24 D24 |
| Date: | 2022–07–18 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aah:aarhec:2022-01&r= |
| By: | Gao, Penghui; Secor, William; Escalante, Cesar L. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Finance, Agribusiness, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2022–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea22:322329&r= |
| By: | Ohlsbom, Roope |
| Abstract: | Abstract Using linked employer-employee data from Finland, we examine the mobility of workers between establishments as a source of productivity-affecting knowledge spillovers. We find evidence that hiring workers from more productive establishments leads to higher productivity in the following year. For an average establishment, this productivity increase amounts to 0.45 percent in our most conservative estimate. The observed productivity gains hold for a variety of specifications, and changes in the receiving establishments’ human capital stock are ruled out as an explanation. |
| Keywords: | Worker mobility, Spillovers, Productivity, Human capital |
| JEL: | D22 D62 J21 J24 J62 L25 |
| Date: | 2022–08–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rif:wpaper:95&r= |
| By: | Ali, Muhammad Tahir; Fulginiti, Lilyan E.; Perrin, Richard K. |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Resource/Energy Economics and Policy, Agricultural and Food Policy |
| Date: | 2022–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea22:322284&r= |
| By: | Giovanna Ciaffi; Matteo Deleidi; Stefano Di Bucchianico |
| Abstract: | Among the explanations for prolonged economic stagnation in advanced economies we find those that highlight the role of technical progress and its weakening impact on potential growth. Several contributions stress the apparent paradox of technological development and innovation going hand in hand with slowing labour productivity growth. This discourse is in turn linked to numerous factors, among which the pattern of research productivity, that appears to be falling in the last decades. The contribution of this article is to analyse the role of innovation expenditures composition, and its effects on productivity. We study whether productivity stagnation can be (partially) explained by the continuously falling ratio between public and private expenditures in innovation in the USA. We carry out an SVAR analysis of the US case during the period 1948Q1-2019Q4. In the empirical exercise we estimate the effect of public expenditure in innovation on productivity, private R&D, and GDP, comparing the outcomes with those relative to private expenditure in innovation. According to our results, the public type of innovation spending exhibits a positive effect on productivity and GDP, and it has a greater effect than private expenditure in innovation. In addition to this, public expenditure in innovation exerts a strong crowding-in effect on private investment in R&D. Therefore, according to the evidence we find, we maintain that the focus on the prolonged and sustained fall of public expenditure in innovation in relation to private expenditure of the same type helps in explaining lasting stagnation |
| Keywords: | Secular Stagnation, public and private R&D, innovation policy, research productivity, productivity growth |
| JEL: | O47 O32 O40 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:usi:wpaper:877&r= |
| By: | Andrew Sharpe; Shahrzad Mobasher Fard |
| Abstract: | Interest in the topic of well-being has burgeoned in recent years as the weaknesses of gross domestic product (GDP) per capita as a proxy for well-being have become more apparent. At the same time, the global economy has experienced a productivity slowdown. Since productivity growth is recognized as being by far the most important long-term source of sustainable gains in living standards, this development has implications for the future of living standards around the world. These two developments raise a number of issues related to the two-way linkages between productivity and well-being. First, does slower productivity growth constitute a significant threat to the betterment of the well-being of the world’s population, and, if so, by how much? Second, given that many indicators of well-being can have positive effects on productivity, should one aspect of any strategy to revive productivity growth be to focus on policies that improve well-being? The objective of this report is to survey the current state of research on the two-way linkages between productivity and well-being. productivity. |
| Keywords: | productivity, well-being |
| Date: | 2022–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sls:resrep:1927&r= |
| By: | James Ashwell |
| Keywords: | Productivity, Wage, Canada |
| Date: | 2021–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sls:resrep:1924&r= |
| By: | David M. Byrne |
| Abstract: | After reviewing the state of digitalization---the use of digital information technology (IT) throughout the economy---we consider the slippery concept of a distinct digital economy and efforts to record it in national accounts. We then anchor the digital economy in a growth accounting framework, augmenting the conventional measure of the IT contribution to productivity---innovation in the production of IT capital plus labor-saving use of IT throughout the economy---with the contribution from the digital platforms that help users navigate the sprawling information landscape. We discuss the difficult measurement issues that thwart a full accounting of the scope and productivity of the digital economy remain. These include quantifying the intangible assets created by platforms and their users, measuring the consumption of intangible services provided by platforms---often provided for free---and identifying platforms within the existing statistical system, which does not treat their activity as a distinct industry. |
| Keywords: | Digital economy; Digitalization |
| JEL: | E31 E22 E01 L63 |
| Date: | 2022–06–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedgfe:2022-38&r= |
| By: | Lin, Stephen F.; Thomas, Catherine; Kalnins, Arturs |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes firm boundaries in the US hotel industry. Hotel properties of a given brand are often managed either by a chain employee or by a franchisee. We document that brand properties with the lowest and the highest occupancy rates are more likely to be managed at arm's length by franchisees. Variation in organizational form is consistent with a model in which the incentives embodied in management contracts vary with property-level productivity. We infer that most hotel chains franchise low-productivity relationships to keep property-level fixed costs low and franchise the most productive relationships to create high-powered incentives for franchisees. Franchisees of high-productivity properties face stronger incentives than the managers of both chain-managed properties and low-productivity franchises because the performance incentives in franchise contracts are proportional to hotel revenues and complement the incentives from franchisees' property control rights. |
| JEL: | D23 F12 L23 |
| Date: | 2020–11–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:115327&r= |
| By: | Mu, Yali; Dalheimer, Bernhard; Cramon-Taubadel, Stephan Von |
| Keywords: | Marketing, International Relations/Trade, Agricultural and Food Policy |
| Date: | 2022–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea22:322355&r= |
| By: | Bachev, Hrabrin |
| Abstract: | There have been continuous debates about the essence and levels of efficiency of farms and agrarian organizations, with an increasing focus on governance aspects in recent years. Nevertheless, most of the existing assessments are at a conceptual or qualitative level due to well-known “measurement” problems related to transacting costs. This article incorporates the New Institutional and Transaction Costs Economics framework and suggests a practical approach for assessing the level and factors of governance efficiency of Bulgarian farms as a whole and of different types and locations. The evaluation of governance efficiency of the country’s farms is made on the basis of original micro-data collected by the managers of typical farms. The "Nature of the problems in effective organization for major class farm transactions for securing needed factors of production and marketing of output" is used as an indicator for the comparative efficiency and adaptability (equal, lower, or greater to another farm/s or organisation/s depending on the extent of transacting difficulties) of individual farms. The study has found that the governance efficiency of farms is at a Good level but 60% of all farms in the county are with a Low efficiency and will likely cease to exist in near future. Major factors for inferior governance efficiency of Bulgarian farms are unsatisfactory efficiency in Supply of Necessary Labour, Innovations and Know-how, and Funding. There is a huge variation in the level and factors of governance efficiency of farms with different juridical types, sizes, product specializations, and geographical and ecological locations as well as in the share of farms with different levels of efficiency in each group. Furthermore, a strong correlation has been found between the level of governance efficiency and adaptability of farms, and diverse critical internal and external market, technological, institutional, personal, etc. factors that could feasibly increase the competitiveness of holdings. The study has proved that there is a big discrepancy between the new assessments of Governance efficiency with dominating traditional approaches for farm efficiency assessments based on factors' productivity. The study has also found that there was an improvement in the overall governance efficiency of Bulgarian farms compared to 2016. Nevertheless, the share of (good and high) efficient farms significantly declined during the same period. The suggested approach has to be further improved, and widely and periodically applied in economic analysis at various levels which require the systemic collection of a novel type of micro-data on farms governance and transaction costs. |
| Keywords: | governance, efficiency, farm, transaction costs, Bulgaria |
| JEL: | D2 L2 Q1 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q18 |
| Date: | 2022–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:113696&r= |