改革中的过度投资需求和效率损失-中国分省固定资产投资案例分析

该文的中心议题是投资效率.我们从基于标准生产函数的投资需求模型出发,从投资需求所处的非均衡状态入手来讨论投资效率.投资需求的非均衡状态由实际投资与理论投资间的偏离来定义.我们将投资效率分成投资的配置效率和投资的生产效率两个方面,并将配置效率与经济制度因素联系起来.我们使用样本期为1989-2000年的中国分省面板数据作为模型分析的实例.分析的重心是中国的过度投资需求在多大程度上是由总投资的配置效率欠佳所造成的.从实例分析中我们发现,资本价格对投资需求几乎无影响,而扩张性的中央与地方财政却对投资需求有着强烈的影响.我们还发现,各省过度投资间存在彼此攀比的网络效应.然而,一旦将这些制度因素分离开来,投资配置效率还是渐有改善的.同时,地区间投资不均的程度也不断有所下降.从投资的生产效率指标估值看,东部沿海省份的效率一般高于西部省份的效率,这是与地区经济的发展水平基本一致的.     

HOW EFFICIENT HAS BEEN CHINA'S INVESTMENT? EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE FROM NATIONAL AND PROVINCIAL DATA

Abstract.  This paper analyses both the allocative efficiency and the dynamic efficiency of China's spending on capital. We examine the relationship between investment flows and the marginal product of capital computed by estimating the Cobb-Douglas and CES production functions at both the national and provincial levels. We also investigate dynamic efficiency by comparing the share of capital in national income and the rate of investment. The main finding is that the allocative efficiency of capital in China has improved in recent years, but the high rate of investment may be a sign of dynamic inefficiency of the Chinese economy.     

The effect of risk-based capital requirements on profit efficiency in banking

The purpose of this paper is twofold: to show how to measure profit efficiency in banking using a newly developed technique, and to use that technique to determine the effect of risk-based capital requirements on the profit performance of US banks. The measure of profit efficiency used captures deviations from profit maximization arising from technical inefficiency, caused by a lack of managerial oversight and allocative inefficiency, which is caused by managers choosing a nonoptimal mix of inputs and outputs. A leverage ratio constraint and a risk-weighted capital ratio constraint are explicitly included in the model, which allows identification of the effect on profits of those constraints. The techniques are applied to random samples of US banks for 1990, 1992, and 1994. The results indicate that allocative inefficiency is a larger source of profit loss than technical inefficiency and that the risk-based capital standards have a significant effect on bank allocative efficiency.     

Measuring and explaining the efficiencies of the United Arab Emirates banking system

Using newly collected data from a survey distributed to all banks in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), this article measures economic efficiency in the banking industry, namely allocative, technical, pure technical and scale efficiency. Employing a nonparametric Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach, the study estimates the efficiency for a cross section of the UAE banks in 2004. The results indicate that the dominant source of inefficiency in the UAE banking is stemming from allocative inefficiency rather than technical inefficiency. Furthermore, the main source of the relatively small size, technical inefficiency in the UAE banking industry is not the scale inefficiency but rather pure technical inefficiency. The results further indicate that the UAE banks are able to use their input resources more efficiently when they have more branches, and that newer banks are performing better than older banks on average. Moreover, the results also show that short experiences of employees affect efficiencies negatively and government ownership tends to reduce efficiency (as the government shares increase in the bank, the efficiency scores get lower). Finally, the most interesting results have to do with finding higher average efficiencies in banks that employ more women, more managers and less national citizens of the UAE.     

Determinants of banks’ Nerlovian economic efficiency: a DEA-bootstrap approach

ABSTRACT

This study aims to evaluate the Nerlovian economic efficiency of Taiwanese commercial banks and its determinants by assuming the presence of an imperfectly competitive market using a two-stage estimation procedure: Nerlovian economic inefficiency and its components’ price, technical and allocative efficiencies computed and decomposed in the first stage, which are regressed on the explanatory variables with a bootstrapped truncated approach in the second stage. The estimation results show that in the first-stage analysis, the Nerlovian economic inefficiency of banks is primarily due to allocative inefficiency, and indicate the existence of price inefficiency in Taiwan. In the second-stage analysis, the results confirm that both the years in operation of the bank and the ratio of credit loans are the main determinants of banking profit efficiency. In addition, this study not only shows that publicly owned banks contribute to better price efficiency but also proves that loan loss reserve to total assets is negatively associated with technical efficiency. The equity ratio exerts an insignificant favourable impact on allocative efficiency. The findings of this research are essential for bank managers in Taiwan.     

Is there a relation between labor investment inefficiency and corporate tax avoidance?

This paper investigates the relation between labor investment inefficiency and corporate tax avoidance. Employing a large sample of 61,542 U.S. firm-year observations over the 1962–2014 period, our regression results show that labor investment inefficiency is significantly positively related to tax avoidance. More specifically, we find that a one standard deviation of labor investment inefficiency leads to a 0.71% reduction in the accounting effective tax rate. Our findings are robust to endogeneity concerns, alternative proxy measures of tax avoidance and labor investment efficiency, and additional control variables pertaining to accounting quality and managerial ability. Taken together, our regression results show that labor investment inefficiency is an important determinant of corporate tax avoidance.     

Economic inefficiency in a revenue setting: the Norwegian whitefish fishery

The main focus in the inefficiency literature is on suboptimal input use and how this causes increased costs, due to technical and allocative inefficiency. Production or cost functions are then typically used to describe the underlying technology of the firm. The possible revenue loss, due to lower than maximum production levels and suboptimal output mix, has received substantially less attention. By using a revenue function to measure inefficiency, the focus, model and estimation technique presented in this article differ from those of previous studies. A shadow revenue model is used to decompose revenue inefficiency into its technical and allocative components, in which the allocative inefficiency is due to a suboptimal output mix. The approach is illustrated using panel data of Norwegian whitefish trawlers. The results reveal large inefficiencies, with respect to output levels as well as output mix, indicating that this can be an important part of the picture when investigating economic inefficiency. To identify the determinants of revenue inefficiency, we conduct a second-step regression, in which technical and allocative inefficiency is regressed upon a set of explanatory variables. The inefficiencies are partly explained by the management system and fleet structure.     

Measurement of technical and allocative efficiencies using a CES cost frontier: a benchmarking study of Japanese transmission-distribution electricity

This paper estimates the technical and allocative inefficiencies of the transmission-distribution sector of Japanese electric utilities using a panel data during the 1981–1998 period. A stochastic production frontier of the CES form is jointly estimated with input demand equations. Taking advantage of the self-duality, we retrieve the cost frontier by which the impacts of technical and allocative inefficiencies on costs and input demands are measured. The estimated elasticity of substitution is significantly different from unity in favor of the CES specification over the Cobb–Douglas. The results show that observed costs are 9 to 48% higher than the efficient level; technical inefficiency raises costs by 1 to 28%, while allocative inefficiency does so by 8 to 30%. Although their impacts on costs are similar, technical inefficiency more fluctuates so the differences in the performance of utilities are mainly due to technical inefficiency. We also find a substantial over-utilization of capital for all utilities.

Bus transit technical efficiency using latent class stochastic indirect production frontier

Using an Indirect Production Frontier (IPF), this article examines technical inefficiency within a latent class framework while simultaneously accounting for allocative distortions from operating and capital subsidies. It identifies two latent classes of US public transit systems, one characterized by economies of scale with 16.61% technical inefficiency and the other by diseconomies of scale with 14.16% technical inefficiency. It decomposes technical inefficiency among some of its sources and finds that the incentive tier of federal operating subsidies, regulations regarding years of vehicle use, subsidy-induced allocative distortion from labour overuse relative to capital negatively influence technical inefficiency in all transit systems. For the Latent Class 1 transit systems, the sources of lower technical inefficiency are operating speed, purchased transportation and years-of-vehicle-use regulation. For the Latent Class 2 transit systems, these sources are subsidy-induced capital-labour allocative distortion and the incentive tier component of the federal formula grant.     

Government Interventions, Market Imperfections, and Technical Inefficiency in a Mixed Economy: A Case Study of Indian Agriculture

This paper uses an output-maximizing framework in the presence of expenditure constraint to measure output loss and input misallocation resulting from market distortions and technical inefficiency. A generalized indirect production function accommodating allocative distortions and technical inefficiency is used. Allocative distortions are captured in terms of effective (shadow) prices in which distortion parameters are both farm- and input-specific. The stochastic frontier approach is used to model technical inefficiency. Using farm-level data on 105 jute growers from West Bengal, India, we find that average output losses due to allocative distortions and technical inefficiency are 6.3% and 14%, respectively.     

Comparing French and US hospital technologies: a directional input distance function approach

French and US hospital technologies are compared using directional input distance functions. The aggregation properties of the directional distance function allow comparison of hospital industry-level performance as well as standard firm-level performance with regard to productive efficiency. In addition, the underlying constituents of efficiency?–?in the short run, congestion and technical inefficiency, and in the long run, scale inefficiency?–?are analysed by decomposing the overall measure. By virtue of using the directional distance function, it is also possible to obtain an estimate of a lower bound on allocative inefficiency. It is found that French and US hospitals use quite different technologies. Long run scale inefficiencies cause most of the French hospitals’?inefficiency, while short run technical inefficiency is the main source of overall productive inefficiency in the US hospitals.     

Banking deregulation and allocative efficiency in Pakistan

This article examines the impact of deregulation policies on allocative efficiency of banks in Pakistan. It investigates whether deregulation has impacted the pattern of allocative efficiency of banks and explores which bank ownership segment has been more responsive. It uses data from 1991 to 2005 and explicitly models allocative inefficiency by using the translog shadow cost-share system. Empirical results show that overregulation and imperfect market structure hampers the ability of banks to make competitive decisions. We find evidence of allocative inefficiency leading to over-utilization of labour and deposits vis-à-vis operating cost. Empirical results for time-varying allocative efficiency show declining levels of allocative inefficiency for state-owned and private banks in post-reform period. Deregulation policies induce state-owned banks to decrease over-utilization of labour relative to deposits and operating cost while private banks succeed in using operating cost closer to optimal levels. Hence, policymakers have latitude to introduce more reforms without jeopardizing allocative efficiency.     

Analysis of production efficiency of beef cow/calf farms in Alberta

This article measures production efficiency across cow–calf farms in Alberta, and examines the sources of variation in efficiency. Average technical, allocative and economic efficiencies are, respectively, 83%, 78% and 67%. Biological efficiency (increased conception, calving and weaning rates), larger herd size, higher share of family labour and greater expense for bedding material reduce inefficiency. Inefficiency was also related to receipt of government subsidies.     

Contractual signaling,relationship-specific investment and exclusive agreements

I analyze a model of hold-up with asymmetric information at the contracting stage. The asymmetry of information concerns the value of trade with external parties. I show that contractual signaling and efficiency of investment can conflict if only quantity is contractible. This conflict generates inefficient equilibria in terms of investment. Contracting on exclusivity in addition to quantity resolves the conflict and consequently eliminates the inefficiency of investment.     

Technical efficiency and scale efficiency in the Italian banking sector: a non-parametric approach

Measures of technical and scale efficiencies are derived in the Italian banking industries by implementing non-parametric Data Envelopment Analysis on a cross section of 174 Italian banks taken in 1991. The methodology of the parametric and non-parametric approaches to measure efficiency are discussed. The existence of both technical and allocative efficiency is established. This result is robust to modifications in the specification of inputs and outputs suggested by the Intermediation Approach and by the Asset Approach. In implementing both the Intermediation and the Asset Approach the traditional specification of inputs is modified to allow an explicit role for financial capital. In addition, regression analysis is used on a bank-specific measure of inefficiency to investigate determinants of banks' efficiency. Efficiency is best explained by productive specialization, size and, to a lesser extent, by location.     

Efficiency in the factoring industry

The efficiency and productivity in the Italian factoring industry between 1993 and 1997 is investigated using DEA. The factoring industry is an important part of many financial systems and it has established itself as a major source of finance and credit management for a growing number of companies. However, as far as the authors are aware no studies have applied frontier methodologies to examine the efficiency and productivity of this industry. This paper focuses on the Italian market, the second largest in the world after the UK. The results suggest that there are substantial cost savings to be had in the Italian factoring industry: the mean cost inefficiency in the Italian factoring industry over the period 1993–1997 ranged between 14% and 22%. These inefficiencies are mainly generated by allocative rather than technical inefficiencies. Scale and technical inefficiencies seem to be similar in magnitude and the supposed importance of the latter typically found in the banking efficiency literature, are not observed in Italian factoring. Firm size does not appear to be related to technical, allocative and economic efficiency and the hypothesis that ownership structure influences factoring firm efficiency could not be rejected. In order to analyse efficiency change over time the Malmquist index is used. Total factor productivity was decomposed into technical change and efficiency change and the latter was further divided into pure efficiency and scale efficiency change. Productivity changes were slight over the period 1993–1996, while a substantial increase in productivity occurred between 1996 and 1997: the latter appears to be the result of a large improvement in the technology and a positive scale efficiency change, however, this was slowed down by a negative pure efficiency change.     

Measuring the productive efficiency of a group of firms

While the conventional Farrell-Färe approach to efficiency measurement can identify the most inefficient firms, it fails to consider the efficiency of a group of firms thoroughly. This paper introduces efficiency measures that can be used to find the efficiency of a group of firms and pinpoint whether the group inefficiency is due to inefficiency inside or outside individual firms. Furthermore, a new way of finding the revenue maximum shadow price vector is introduced to compute the allocative efficiency of individual firms when price data are not available.     

Economic Reform and Total Factor Productivity Growth in Indian Manufacturing Industries

A stochastic frontier production function model is applied to Indian manufacturing industries, to decompose the sources of total factor productivity growth into technical progress, technical efficiency, scale efficiency, and allocative efficiency. Empirical results based on data from 2000 to 2006 suggest that increased investment needs time to deliver increased productivity and efficiency, because new technology combined with fresh investment requires higher numbers of skilled workers, better managerial practices and an advanced input mix, all of which generally take time to develop. Thus, the Indian economy must boost technical efficiency by providing skilled workers and high quality managers to further economic reform.     

An Experimental Study of the Effect of Private Information in the Coase Theorem

We investigate, in an experimental setting, the effect of private information on the Coase theorem's predictions of efficiency and allocative neutrality. For a two-person bargaining game, we find significantly more inefficiency and allocative bias in the case of private information compared with the case of complete information. We also find substantial bargaining breakdown, which is not predicted by the Coase theorem. For the case of private information, we reject the Coase theorem in favor of the alternative of a generalized version of the Myerson—Satterthwaite theorem, which predicts inefficiency, allocative bias in the direction of the disagreement point, and some bargaining breakdown.     

The contributions of technical and allocative efficiency to the economic performance of European railways

This paper provides an empirical analysis of the relative contributions of allocative and technical efficiency to the productivity performance of European railways over the period 1972 to 1999. A stochastic frontier approach is used to analyse the cost structure of the railway industry. We estimate a translog cost system in which allocative inefficiency is modelled through an exact relationship between the cost share equations and the cost function. To allow the estimation of such a model using the sample theory approach we assume that the share equation residuals represent deviations from first-order conditions and, therefore, that they represent exclusively allocative inefficiencies. The use of this simplifying assumption renders our analysis computationally tractable, but it could be inconsistent with the economic theory of duality and for that reason caution is required in interpretation of results. Acknowledging this caveat, we find that European railways have experienced significant cost increases due to inefficient behaviour, with a mean value of around 15%. In contrast to previous studies, however, our estimates indicate a larger role for allocative inefficiency, which accounts for around of a half of the total increase in cost inefficiency.