為了解在中國政府正式開始扶植中國半導體產業之後該產業生產率的動態變化，本研究以2001年至2007年之間中國半導體產業的企業層面資料為樣本範圍，並使用Olley和Pakes(1996)的三階段估計法對個別廠商生產率進行估計，同時有效解決傳統使用OLS方法估計生產率會產生的聯立性和樣本選擇問題。接著，再利用Melitz和Pakes(2015)年針對Olley和Pakes(1996)的模型加入廠商進退出市場決策之生產率動態分解模型，對兩兩年度的生產率變動進行拆解。有別於過去文獻主要以中國半導體產業的經營策略為主軸，敘述產業發展，或是使用其他計量方法推估廠商生產率而忽略廠商進出市場行為，本研究將受中國政府提供優惠政策而進入中國市場投資半導體產業和因經營方向不合時宜而遭市場淘汰退出的廠商行為納入考量，並試圖歸納2000年以來中國政府對半導體產業態度的轉變對於廠商生產率帶來的影響。 / The main purpose of the study is to examine the dynamics and decomposition of total factor productivity in China’s semiconductor industry after the government started to pour support and investment into the industry. This study uses firm-level financial and production data to estimate total factor productivity with Olley-Pakes estimation to eliminate both simultaneity problem and selection bias. Furthermore, it separates the contribution of firms to the aggregate productivity changes into three categories for surviving, entering, and exiting firms. Apart from studying merely business strategies, the research aims at taking entry and exit effects into account and also figuring out the impact of the policy of China’s government on the entire semiconductor industry since 2000.

This doctoral thesis consists of three essays. In the first essay I investigate the presence of productivity convergence in eight regional pulp and paper industries of U.S. and Canada over the period of 1971-2005. Expectation of productivity convergence in the pulp and paper industries of Canadian provinces and of the states of its southern neighbour is high since they are trading partners with fairly high level of exchanges in both pulp and paper products. Moreover, they share a common production technology that changed very little over the last century. I supplement the North-American regional data with national data for two Nordic countries, Finland and Sweden, which provides a scope to compare the productivity performances of four leading players in global pulp and paper industry. I find evidence in favour of the catch-up hypothesis among the regional pulp and paper industries of U.S. and Canada in my sample. The growth performance is at the advantage of Canadian provinces relative to their U.S. counterparts. However, it is not good enough to surpass the growth rates of this industry in the two Nordic countries. It is well-known that econometric productivity estimation using flexible functional forms often encounter violations of curvature conditions. However, the productivity literature does not provide any guidance on the selection of appropriate functional forms once they satisfy the theoretical regularity conditions. The second chapter of my thesis provides an empirical evidence that imposing local curvature conditions on the flexible functional forms affect total factor productivity (TFP) estimates in addition to the elasticity estimates. Moreover, I use this as a criterion for evaluating the performances of three widely used locally flexible cost functional forms - the translog (TL), the Generalized Leontief (GL), and the Normalized Quadratic (NQ) - in providing TFP estimates. Results suggest that the NQ model performs better than the other two functional forms in providing TFP estimates. The third essay capitalizes on newly available high frequency energy consumption data from commercial buildings in the District of Columbia (DC) to provide novel insights on the realized energy use impacts of energy efficiency standards in commercial buildings. Combining these data with hourly weather data and information on tenancy contract structure I evaluate the impacts of energy standards, contractual structure of utility bill payments, and energy star labeling on account level electricity consumption. Using this unique panel dataset, the analysis takes advantage of detailed building-level characteristics and the heterogeneity in the building age distribution, resulting in buildings constructed before and after mandatory energy standards came into effect. Estimation results suggest that in commercial buildings constructed under a code, electricity consumption is lower by about 0.48 kWh per cooling degree hour. When tenants pay for their own utilities, consumption is lower by 0.82 kWh per cooling degree hour. The Energy Star effect is a 0.31 kWh reduction per cooling degree hour. Finally, peak savings for all three variables of interest occur at 2pm in the summer months, whereas peak summer marginal prices at DC's local electric utility occur at 5pm.