Productivity growth,technical progress and efficiency change in Spanish retail trade (1995–2004): a disaggregated sectoral analysis

This article analyses productivity growth in Spanish retail stores during the period 1995–2004. It is also interested in analysing the influence of regulation/deregulation processes on the efficiency and productivity of the firms. The analysis is carried out from a disaggregated sectoral perspective at the 4-digit NACE code level. The non-parametric Data Envelopment Analysis approach is used to compute Malmquist productivity indexes. These are decomposed into efficiency change and technical change. Big differences are found in the productivity growth for each sector. First, six retail sectors experienced positive productivity growth, while six saw productivity growth decrease. Second, most sectors experienced technical progress. Third, some sectors improved their efficiency, while others became less efficient. Fourth, the TFP improvements were almost entirely due to technical progress, and only four sectors improved their efficiency. The findings obtained from the analysis of the deregulation of opening hours show two important facts: (i) the differences in the productivity and the efficiency of the firms between sectors, and (ii) the losses /improvements of efficiency of the firms in relation to the effects of the shop opening hours or the lack of adaptation to the environment.     

Total Factor Productivity in the Turkish Insurance Industry

This paper employs the Malmquist total factor productivity (TFP) index to examine the total factor productivity change in the life and non‐life branches of the Turkish insurance sector for the period 2000–2005. The Malmquist productivity index is decomposed into two components: the efficiency change component and the technical change component. The results indicate a decrease of 19.4 % in total factor productivity in the life insurance sector and an increase of 6.1% in the non‐life insurance sector during the sample period. Significant TFP growth in the non‐life insurance sector has occurred during 2003–2005. This growth is seen to be mainly due to the change in production technology. The firms are then split into two groups, domestic and foreign firms, according to their ownership composition. The results indicate a decline in total factor productivity for both groups in the life insurance sector whereas in the non‐life insurance sector, an increase in the total factor productivity of domestic firms is observed.     

Technical efficiency and productivity growth of entrant firms in the retail sector in Spain

This paper analyses efficiency and productivity growth in relation to size, and age and for both entrant and incumbent firms using a birth cohort approach for the period 1995–2003 for two sectors, non-specialized shop (521) and specialized shop (524) three-digit NACE. On the one hand, our results indicate the existence of statistically significant differences among entrant and incumbent firms by size. Also, we found differences according to the start up size in relation to membership of the birth cohort and activity sectors. On the other hand, productivity growth shows that, in general, the larger entrants in the non-specialized sector obtained higher productivity than did small firms. This phenomenon was not observed in the specialized sector, where firms worsened in productivity in most of the cohorts and we did not find significant differences in productivity growth between large and small firms. Efficiency changes tend to be a positive contributor to total factor productivity change, but technical change tends to be a negative contributor for both sectors. A deeper analysis of the efficiency changes (catching up) has shown that these improvements are generally attributed to pure technical efficiency and the scale.     

Total Factor Productivity Growth and Technical Change in the Water and Sewerage Industry

The characteristics of total factor productivity growth and technical change in the water and sewerage industry of England and Wales are ‘examined within this article. Total factor productivity growth, technical change and the components of technical change are quantified using a time trend model. A translog specification of productive technology is employecl. Very low levels of technical change, the components of technical change and total factor productivity growth are observed over the sample period. Substantial economies of scale are recorded. Three major implications may be drawn from the study findings. Initially, the high levels of investment have yet to .substantially influence the productive technology of the water and sewerage firrns. Secondly, strong empirical evidence of the natural monopoly conditions in the water industry provided. Finally, it may be stated that privatisation does not appear to have raised the level of technical change or productivity growth since 1989.     

THE OPTIMAL LIFETIME OF ASSETS UNDER UNCERTAINTY IN THE RATE OF EMBODIED TECHNICAL CHANGE

I investigate the effects of uncertainty regarding the rate of embodied technical change on the lifetime of assets using a model where: (1) technical change increases continuously the productivity of producers’ durables, (2) potential competition induces firms to pass all benefits from productivity improvements to consumers, and (3) the mean and the variance are considered sufficient statistics to describe the probability distribution of technological change. I find that in general this type of uncertainty shortens the optimal lifetime of assets. However, the robustness of the results under alternative specifications of the probability distribution of technological change remains an open question.     

DO RISING REAL WAGES INCREASE THE RATE OF LABOR‐SAVING TECHNICAL CHANGE? SOME ECONOMETRIC EVIDENCE

The long‐run relationship between real wages and labor productivity is investigated using cointegration and Granger non‐causality tests for the US economy over the period 1869–1999. The series are cointegrated, indicating that there is a link between real wages and labor productivity in the long run. Granger non‐causality tests support unidirectional causation from real wages to labor productivity. This outcome corroborates the conception that increases in real wages drive profit‐seeking capitalists to raise labor productivity as their main weapon in defending their profitability. This result is consistent with a long tradition among economists that perceives technical change as being biased toward labor‐saving.     

Assessing the Impact of Changing Economic Environment on Productivity Growth: The Case of the Spanish Dairy Processing Industry

This article analyzes the productivity growth of the Spanish dairy processing industry from 1996 till 2011, which concerns the period of increased EU regulation regarding food safety as well as economic crisis. Data envelopment analysis is used to compute the Malmquist index and its components. The results suggest that productivity on average declined during the period under investigation. The decomposition of the Malmquist index finds that technical regress contributed to productivity decline despite improvements in technical and scale efficiencies. Our results also suggest that food safety regulations did not have a negative impact on productivity growth. Technical change and scale efficiency change made significant negative contributions to productivity growth in the period under crisis, whereas firms significantly improved their technical efficiency in that period.     

资源环境双重规制下中国地区全要素生产率研究——基于1996-2009年的实证分析

基于已有文献在研究全要素生产率时不考虑环境因素,或者仅考虑环境因素而忽视能源投入的现实,文章将资源和环境因素同时纳入生产率研究框架,对1996-2009年中国省级经济单元的全要素生产率(TFP)进行了测算,并将全要素生产率变动分解为技术效率变化和技术进步变化;对技术效率变化进一步分解为纯技术效率变化和规模效率变化,实现了TFP增长的动态分解,并研究了TFP变动的影响因素.研究结果表明,考虑资源环境约束,我国整体TFP较低,还存在较大的改进空间;TFP增长的主要源泉在于技术利用效率的提高,而技术进步和规模效率的作用并不明显.工业产值所占比重、资本/劳动比率上升不利于TFP的提高,外资引入对TFP改进具有拟制作用,降低国有经济比重和政府对市场经济的过度干预、增加环境污染治理投资有助于全要素生产率的提高.在生产效率(或经济增长效率)的核算中,忽略资源环境因素的冲击,有可能导致经济增长效率被高估,由此得出的政策建议会带有一定的误导性.     

服务业 FDI的技术溢出与中国服务业生产率增长

经济增长理论认为,FDI是一国获取外国先进技术的重要渠道。本文采用DEA方法将中国13个服务行业的全要素生产率增长分解为技术效率和技术进步的增长,就服务业FDI对生产率增长的影响作了实证分析。研究发现,在2004～2008年期间,中国服务行业的全要素生产率增长的原因主要是各行业的技术进步增长,而不是技术效率的提高;服务业FDI显著地促进了服务行业的全要素生产率增长、技术效率和技术进步的增长。     

我国银行业改革中的商业银行效率演进:基于M指数法的实证分析

本文利用基于DEA的曼奎斯特生产率指数法测算了1993-2006年我国商业银行曼奎斯特生产率指数、技术效率指数和技术进步指数,并时市场竞争度、所有权结构、银行初始效率水平与生产率增长、技术效率提高和技术进步的关系进行了实证检验.结果表明,商业化改革对我国商业银行全要素生产率变化具有显著影响:我国商业银行的生产率是增长的,1999年以前生产率增长主要源于技术进步带来的"追赶效应",1999年以后则源于技术进步带来的"前沿面移动效应";我国商业银行的生产率增长和技术效率提高有趋同的趋势,初始效率低的国有银行生产率增长和效率提高的速度快于效率较高的股份制银行;最后,本文发现市场竞争和产权结构都对商业银行生产率增长、效率提高和技术进步具有重要的影响.     

Technical efficiency and human capital in the retail sector

The performance of the British retail sectors in terms of productivity growth is not brilliant. This paper focuses on a specific component of productivity growth (technical efficiency) and tests the extent to which its variance across the sector can be explained by the differences in the educational attainment of the pool of workers to which retail firms have access. The empirical analysis is carried out on a sample of 1061 retail firms from the Annual Respondents Database, 1997–2005. The results confirm that the county-level differences of the stock of human capital can explain the technical efficiency differentials across the sector.     

中国商业银行全要素生产率测度及其影响因素分析

文章利用Malmquist生产率指数测算了中国14家商业银行2000-2006年的全要素生产率、技术效率和技术变化,并构建Panel Data模型对影响中国商业银行效率的因素进行实证检验.结果表明,2000-2006年中国商业银行全要素生产率平均增长率为4.88%,其主要来源于技术进步的作用,国有商业银行全要素生产率增长比股份制商业银行高,ATM与POS投资对中国商业银行全要素生产率有显著正影响,自有资本比例有利于改善商业银行生产效率,而存贷款比例、规模、资产费用率与商业银行生产效率提高没有显著联系.     

Did Liberalization Impact Productivity of the Indian Electronics Hardware Industry?

In this paper, we analyse the trends in productivity, both partial and total, in the four sectors of the Indian electronics hardware industry after liberalization. Using an innovative combination of two established but independent methodologies, we estimate the contributions of technical efficiency change and technological progress to total factor productivity growth (TFPG) and thereby to output growth. Contrary to expectations, we found that none of the four sectors in the industry achieved impressive growth in capital productivity and TFPG despite the new economic reforms. The firms emphasised technological progress at the cost of technical efficiency change but failed to sustain TFPG as the liberalization of policies intensified further. Surprisingly the firms’ effort to employ skilled labour, larger scales of production and their strategy to improve production technology through R&D and/or imports did not benefit productivity substantially. In a comparative study with China, we found that the Indian electronics hardware industry did not perform as well as that of China due to the persistent rigid and bureaucratic procedures, labour market inefficiencies and inadequate infrastructure, among others.     

Induced Innovation,Endogenous Technical Change and Income Distribution in a Labor‐Constrained Model of Classical Growth

We present a steady state analysis of a labor‐constrained classical growth model with endogenous direction and intensity of technical change. Firms use retained profits to raise their productive capacity and to improve labor and capital productivities. Investments are planned to maximize instantaneous profits. Comparative dynamics exercises show that (1) an increase in the saving rate and in R&D subsidies raises the steady state labor share, labor productivity growth and the employment rate, and (2) a rise in workers' bargaining power reduces the employment rate while leaving productivity growth and distribution unaffected.     

中性还是偏向性技术变迁影响出口?——基于细分行业贸易数据的经验分析

运用Tobit模型对中国SITC-3位码行业出口数据进行实证分析,本文发现,生产率越高的行业出口能力越强,技术变迁带来的效率改进是出口增长的重要原因。但与中性技术变迁相比,偏向性技术变迁更适合解释中国不同行业的相对出口存在差异的问题。劳动和资本密集型行业发生的偏向资本技术变迁,是中国劳动密集型产品出口比重不断减小,而资本密集型产品出口比重不断增加的重要原因。偏向资本的技术变迁,以及由此引起的要素相对生产率改变,与要素相对禀赋一起,预示着我国动态比较优势的逐渐形成。     

Are Small Firms Really Less Productive?

Small and medium-sized establishments (SMEs) account for a large proportion of industrial employment and production in almost all countries. Moreover, the recent literature emphasizes the role SMEs play in nurturing entrepreneurship and generating new products and processes. Although SMEs could be a source of new ideas and innovations, there are substantial productivity differences between small and large establishments. In this paper, we analyze three sources of productivity differentials: technical efficiency, returns to scale, and technical change. Our analysis on the creation, survival, and growth of new establishments in Turkish manufacturing industries in the period 1987–1997 shows that all these three factors play a very important role in determining the survival probability and growth prospects of new establishments.     

Assessing productivity in the presence of negative data and undesirable outputs

Few studies address the presence of negative data and undesirable outputs in productivity assessment. This study proposes a range-adjusted measure model that uses a non-radial Malmquist productivity index to estimate dynamic productivity in the presence of negative data and undesirable outputs. Banking-industry data are used to demonstrate the proposed model. The results show that during the 2007–2009 global financial crises, bank productivity deteriorated, mainly because of technical changes, and smaller banks suffered smaller financial losses. Finally, a decision making matrix based on the analysis results is presented to show the implications of the proposed method.     

Productivity change of microfinance institutions in Kenya: A bootstrap Malmquist approach

This paper uses a DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) based Malmquist approach to investigate the changes in productivity of 20 Kenyan microfinance institutions (MFIs) over the period 2009–2012. A bootstrap procedure is employed to determine whether the changes in Malmquist index and its components are statistically significant. Results show that MFIs have experienced about 7% annual productivity progress on average, which is mainly attributable to technological advances. A second-stage bootstrapped regression analysis is employed to examine the impact of several environmental variables on productivity change measures. Results show that matured MFIs tend to have a lower productivity compared to their younger counterparts. Results also reveal that higher return-on-assets associates with the productivity gain and technological improvements.     

基于DEA的煤炭效率测算及随机性趋同研究

利用数据包络分析对全国及区域煤炭效率进行测算,全国和各区域的煤炭能源年平均Malmquist生产力指数均呈现稍有波动但整体下滑趋势,其中华北和东北主要源于技术效率变动特别是纯技术效率变动出现了下滑;而对于西南、中南近期出现的稍有上升趋势,则更多源于规模效率变动的上升;西北和华东则是由于技术变动下滑趋势。煤炭能源效率随机性趋同显示,各省和作为整体的华北的煤炭能源效率有向全国平均值水平移动的趋势;而对区域内部趋同进一步研究发现,除西北区域其他区域内部均不存在随机性趋同趋势。这一研究为提高煤炭效率走低碳经济之路提出相关政策检验。     

基于等效益面生产函数的经济增长成因分析

一个评价单元的等效益面生产函数是这个单元的技术效率与前沿面生产函数之积。来自于投入要素以外的经济增长(泛全要素生产率变化率)就是等效益面生产函数的相对垂直移动。由此,可将一个评价单元的泛全要素生产率变化率分解为四个驱动力的代数和。这四个驱动力分别是:技术进步、技术效率的改善、偏生产率的变化和规模效应。基于等效益面生产函数上的这个代数分解式既能解释经济增长的原因,又具有明确的几何意义,从而为进一步测算各驱动力对经济增长的贡献率奠定了理论基础。