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on Efficiency and Productivity |
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Issue of 2024‒07‒15
thirteen papers chosen by |
| By: | Josh Martin (King's College London, ESCoE, TPI) |
| Keywords: | Public service productivity, government output, tax collection, economic measurement |
| JEL: | D24 H11 H21 |
| Date: | 2024–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:anj:wpaper:043&r= |
| By: | Facundo Costa de Arguibel (Universidad Nacional de Misiones); Juan Antonio Dip (Universidad Nacional de Misiones); Gerardo Stvass (Universidad Nacional de Misiones) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we apply a two-stage data envelopment analysis to study the effect of the interrelation between banking activities, the ownership structure, and the technical efficiency of Argentine banks (2012-2019). The first stage involves a Bootstrapped DEA to estimate the banks’ technical efficiency with and without service revenues. The second stage estimates a truncated regression with Bootstrap to examine the effect of non-traditional activities and the origin of assets on the technical efficiency of banks. Besides, we control for differences in the entities’ financial risk and the influence of environmental variables. Our robust results show that non-traditional activities are positively related to bank efficiency. Those banks that have a greater presence in non-traditional activities are more efficient. On the other hand, foreign banks with a greater weight in non-traditional activities are more efficient than their local peers. Foreign banks better exploit the advantages of diversification of activities compared to/over their local peers. Finally, public banks are more inefficient than private ones. The results are robust to changes in the selection and specification of certain variables. |
| Keywords: | Banking diversification; Non-traditional activities; Efficiency; Double Bootstrap Regression DEA; Argentina |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aoz:wpaper:326&r= |
| By: | Chadha J. S., Samiri, I.; Samiri, I. |
| Abstract: | We investigate UK labour productivity over the long run, comparing it to other advanced economies and focus on the sharp slowdown since the global financial crisis. Using a growth accounting framework, we find a dominant role for total factor productivity (TFP), but it turns out that capital shallowing is also important. Two macroeconomic trends deepen the puzzle of this slowdown. There has been a decline in real interest rates over the past 30 years and an increase in labour supply since 2008, both of which ought to have increased investment. And yet, the ratio of (nominal) private and public investment to GDP has fallen over time. We go on to examine the UK’s productivity performance through the lens of standard neoclassical models and reconsider the secular stagnation debate in the UK context. Finally, we survey several explanations from recent economic literature for the poor performance of investment. |
| Keywords: | Productivity, Macroeconomics, Real Interest Rates, Investment |
| JEL: | E22 E24 E32 E44 E51 E62 O16 O42 O47 |
| Date: | 2024–06–27 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cam:camdae:2437&r= |
| By: | JaeBin Ahn; Shekhar Aiyar; Andrea F. Presbitero |
| Abstract: | This paper provides cross-country firm-level evidence on productivity spillovers from foreign direct investment |
| Date: | 2024–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bre:wpaper:node_10134&r= |
| By: | Lalinsky, Tibor; Meriküll, Jaanika; Lopez-Garcia, Paloma |
| Abstract: | This paper studies how the Covid-19 pandemic and the extensive job retention support that accompanied it affected productivity in Europe. The focus is on the reallocation channel and productivity-enhancing reallocation of jobs, following Foster et al., 2016. An extensive micro-distributed analysis of firm-level data for 11 euro area countries is used. The unique firm-level datasets are constructed by merging balance-sheet and income-statement data with policy support data. The paper exploits variation in employment responsiveness to productivity over time, particularly examining the relationship between changes in employment responsiveness and the job retention support in 2020 and studying how well the support was targeted by firm productivity. Acknowledging limitations of a small set of countries covered and occasionally large confidence bounds around estimates, the findings suggest that (1) productivity-enhancing reallocation was weaker in the pandemic than in the Great Recession; (2) The countries that were more generous with job retention support and countries where more support was allocated to low-productivity firms showed weaker productivity-enhancing reallocation in 2020. JEL Classification: D22, H25, J38, L29 |
| Keywords: | adjustment of firms, Covid-19, cross-country analysis, job retention support, productivity-enhancing reallocation |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ecb:ecbwps:20242947&r= |
| By: | Dobbelaere, Sabien (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam); König, Michael D. (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam); Spescha, Andrin (ETH Zurich); Wörter, Martin (ETH Zurich) |
| Abstract: | The fraction of R&D active firms decreased in Switzerland but increased in the Netherlands from 2000-2016. This paper examines reasons for this divergence and its impact on productivity growth. Our micro-data reveal R&D concentration among high-productivity firms in Switzerland. Innovation support sustains firms' R&D activities in both countries. Our structural growth model identifies the impact of innovation, imitation and R&D costs on firms' R&D decisions. R&D costs gained importance in Switzerland but not in the Netherlands, explaining the diverging R&D trends. Yet, counterfactual analyses show that policies should prioritize enhancing innovation and imitation success over cost reduction to boost productivity growth. |
| Keywords: | R&D, innovation, imitation, R&D costs, policy, productivity growth, traveling wave |
| JEL: | E61 E65 D22 O31 O47 O52 |
| Date: | 2024–05 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17026&r= |
| By: | Vivien Lefebvre (LARGE - Laboratoire de Recherche en Gestion et Economie - UNISTRA - Université de Strasbourg) |
| Keywords: | Potential slack zero-debt firms performance SMEs, Potential slack, zero-debt firms, performance, SMEs |
| Date: | 2023–03–16 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04585954&r= |
| By: | Peter Dickinson (Warwick Institute for Employment Research); Emily Erickson (Warwick Institute for Employment Research); Chris Warhurst (Warwick Institute for Employment Research) |
| Keywords: | Research, development, innovation, regional, sectoral |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:anj:ppaper:034&r= |
| By: | Francesco Del Prato; Paolo Zacchia |
| Abstract: | We document how a reduction in labor costs led to heterogeneous effects on the total factor productivity (TFP) of manufacturing firms. Leveraging an Italian labor legislation reform and unique institutional features of the local collective bargaining system, we show that such effects vary along the TFP distribution. Relative to the counterfactual, TFP markedly declines on the left tail, which we explain via selection mechanisms; on the right, TFP mildly increases as firms are able to expand and reallocate their workforce. To guide the evaluation of welfare implications, we develop a general equilibrium model featuring firm selection and frictions in input markets. |
| Keywords: | labor costs, productivity, collective bargaining, quantile effects |
| JEL: | D22 D24 J08 O14 |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cer:papers:wp783&r= |
| By: | Sébastien Bock (OFCE - Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po); Aya Elewa (OFCE - Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po); Sarah Guillou (OFCE - Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po); Mauro Napoletano (OFCE - Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po); Lionel Nesta (OFCE - Observatoire français des conjonctures économiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po) |
| Abstract: | Over the past 20 years, the gap in per capita income between the United States and the eurozone, which stood at around €10, 000 in 2000, has not narrowed. It has widened since 2012. GDP per capita in the eurozone fell from 77% to 72% of US GDP per capita the 2000 and 2019, thus diverging from the level of wealth on the other side of the Atlantic.This gradual decoupling of GDP per capita started before the pandemic. This Policy Brief therefore looks at this European lagging – the widening gap – over the twenty years before the pandemic and the energy crisis, from 2000 to 2019, and explores possible explanations for this decoupling. Our results show that divergence between the eurozone and the United States is mainly due to lower hour productivity growth in the former. It also appears that capital, much more than differences in working hours, is a major factor in the divergence between the two zones. Productive efficiency diverges because of lower capital intensity in information and communication technology (ICT) equipment on the one hand, and in intangible assets on the other. The amount of ICT capital per job was five times higher in the United States in 2019; the amount of intangible capital per job was three times higher. These yawning gaps in 2019 were not as much as wide in 2000. Of course, there are also big differences between the Member States of the eurozone, so we must be careful not to draw premature conclusions about the European aggregate and the inadequacy of Europe's policies. Indeed, Germany comes close to the US level (82% in 2019); France stands out for its sustained intangible investment, but without distinguishing itself in terms of GDP growth; and Italy lags behind, with very low level of productivity gains and intangible investment, while Spain is in a process of catching up. Despite these intra-European differences, the capital factor seems to be the driving force behind the gap and divergence for all the countries observed. And by its very nature, the deficit in capital accumulation will also be the cause of divergence after 2019. If policy recommendations are to be defined, they must aim at increasing the investment in ICT and intangible assets to catch up with the level of capital available per job in the United States. |
| Date: | 2024–05–30 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-04593877&r= |
| By: | Eder, Andreas; Koller, Wolfgang; Mahlberg, Bernhard |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the contribution of industrial robots to employment change in manufacturing in a sample of 17 European countries and the USA over the period 2004 to 2019. We combine index decomposition analysis (IDA) and production-theoretical decomposition analysis (PDA). First, we use IDA to decompose employment change in the manufacturing industry into changes in (aggregate) manufacturing output, changes in the sectoral structure of the manufacturing industry, and changes in labour intensity which is a composite index of labour intensity change within each of the nine sub-sectors of total manufacturing. Second, we use PDA to further decompose labour intensity change to isolate the contribution of technical efficiency change, technological change, human capital change, change in non-robot capital intensity and change in robot capital intensity to employment change. In almost all of the countries considered, the labour intensity is falling in entire manufacturing, which has a dampening effect on employment. Robotisation contributes to this development by reducing labour intensities and employment in all countries and sub-sectors, though to varying degrees. Manufacturing output, in turn, grows in all countries (except Greece, Spain and Italy), which increases employment and counteracts or in some countries even more than offsets the dampening effect of declining labour intensities. The structural change within manufacturing has an almost neutral effect in many countries. |
| Keywords: | automation; robotisation; decomposition; structural change; data envelopment analysis |
| JEL: | C43 J21 J24 O33 |
| Date: | 2024–06–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:121128&r= |
| By: | Nonnis, Alberto; Roth, Felix; Bounfour, Ahmed |
| Abstract: | This paper presents a puzzling finding: although France invests twice as much in intangible capital vis-à-vis Germany, both countries have similar LPG rates over the studied period from 1995 until 2020. We find that this difference in investments is driven by France's four- and two-and-a-half-fold investments in software and organizational capital. Our paper offers three perspectives to clarify the puzzle. First, higher investments in intangible capital in France might suggest a better readiness of the country towards the next generation of investment. However, France's investments in intangibles appear to be less efficient compared to those of Germany. Third, measurement problems in the software and organizational capital investment series are also to be considered to understand this major puzzle. |
| Keywords: | Intangible capital, Labour Productivity, Germany, France, EU |
| Date: | 2024 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:uhhhdp:16&r= |
| By: | Gravina, Antonio Francesco (University of Palermo); Lanzafame, Matteo (Asian Development Bank) |
| Abstract: | The substantial literature on the existence of an inverted U-shaped relationship between environmental degradation and economic growth—known as the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC)—has produced very mixed evidence. This largely depends on model and variable selection uncertainty. We address these issues relying on Bayesian Model Averaging techniques. Our results indicate that the EKC has an inverted-N shape, with almost all emerging economies analyzed on the upward segment of the curve displaying a positive association between per capita gross domestic product and carbon dioxide emissions, and most advanced economies analyzed on the second downward segment of the curve. These findings are robust to the use of different measures of environmental pollution and (non-Bayesian) Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator (LASSO) regression techniques. |
| Keywords: | Environmental Kuznets Curve; economic growth; model uncertainty |
| JEL: | C52 O13 Q56 |
| Date: | 2024–06–26 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ris:adbewp:0731&r= |