Diss. Göteborg : Univ., 2002.

<p>The relationship between increased productivity and improved standard of living is not a questioned statement on the global level, but does productivity growth necessarily lead to higher standard of living on the national level? Supported by empirical results it is suggested that a high relative productivity growth should not always be worth striving for, since it translates into decreased welfare, in terms of deteriorated terms of trade. This study attempts to examine the impact of relative productivity on the terms of trade in the OECD-countries and in Sweden, with an error-correction model. Further is an extension of the purpose made in order to estimate the impact of increased relative productivity growth on the welfare. The results suggest that the method for measuring productivity has a great impact on the findings, but concludes that a 1% higher relative labour productivity growth is associated with a 0.23% decline in the terms of trade.</p>

The relationship between increased productivity and improved standard of living is not a questioned statement on the global level, but does productivity growth necessarily lead to higher standard of living on the national level? Supported by empirical results it is suggested that a high relative productivity growth should not always be worth striving for, since it translates into decreased welfare, in terms of deteriorated terms of trade. This study attempts to examine the impact of relative productivity on the terms of trade in the OECD-countries and in Sweden, with an error-correction model. Further is an extension of the purpose made in order to estimate the impact of increased relative productivity growth on the welfare. The results suggest that the method for measuring productivity has a great impact on the findings, but concludes that a 1% higher relative labour productivity growth is associated with a 0.23% decline in the terms of trade.

This dissertation evaluates the empirical relation between the value-added tax (VAT) and the level of aggregate consumption. Furthermore, it develops a theoretical framework and an empirical analysis to study the impact of the VAT, as a form of taxing consumption, on capital accumulation, productivity growth, and overall economic growth. While recent theoretical work shows that the VAT may boost capital accumulation and growth by encouraging more savings, we find that the net impact of consumption taxes on growth and its sources is theoretically ambiguous, and depends on the interaction between utility parameters, the interest rate, and the tax structure. Moreover, we develop a theoretical model to study the tax design problem in order to rationalize the observed variation in effective VAT rates over time in our sample. This framework considers both equity and efficiency as important factors determining optimal tax structure, and we identify conditions under which taxes could be evolving or constant over time. Empirically, we use a panel of 15 European Union countries and employ the recently developed GMM dynamic panel techniques. After controlling for the potential biases associated with persistence, endogeneity, simultaneity, measurement error, omitted variables, and unobserved country-specific effects, we find that (i) the VAT exerts a negative impact on the level of aggregate consumption, (ii) the VAT affects physical capital accumulation positively, which feeds through to overall GDP growth, and (iii) productivity growth seems to be a less relevant channel for the VAT to influence economic growth.

xiii, 124 p. : ill. (some col.) / This dissertation emphasizes three aspects of structural change in economic development. Structural change is the process by which the distribution of economic output shifts from one sector to another and is crucial to understanding overall economic growth. The first chapter demonstrates that property rights and the relative value of land in rural credit markets have significant implications for the rate and level of economic development. When borrowers have little net worth, access to credit is limited and the transition from agriculture to industry proceeds at a slower rate. A quantitative model provides estimates of the welfare cost of such frictions. The second chapter argues that differential costs of technology adoption across developing countries can explain the failure of some import-substitution strategies. An analytical model demonstrates the importance of such adoption costs, and an empirical section finds evidence in support of it. The primary result is that import-substituting policies aimed at rapid industrialization may in fact inhibit economic growth, explaining why some countries have experienced lower rates of economic development. The third chapter uses a robust econometric procedure to estimate sector-specific productivity growth for a sample of OECD countries. It finds that the sources of productivity growth vary widely across countries. Productivity growth is not concentrated in industrial sectors alone but can also result from advances in service sectors. / Committee in charge: Dr. Shankha Chakraborty, Chair; Dr. Chris Ellis, Member; Dr. Bruce Blonigen, Member; Dr. Jean Stockard, Outside Member

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Dennis L. Weisman / This empirical dissertation consists of three essays on mergers and regulation in the U.S. telecommunications industry. An abstract for each of the three essays follows. Essay 1: This study has attempted to measure the productivity growth associated with 25 incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) over the period 1996-2005 using a Malmquist productivity index. The average efficiency scores for our sample companies have not changed significantly between 1996 and 2005, which indicates that the average ILECs shows no measurable improvement in terms of optimizing their input-output combinations over time. We find some empirical evidence of a positive merger effect, although this effect diminishes over time. In addition, we find that non-merged firms underperform in terms of average productivity growth. Essay 2: This study analyzes the merger effects for 25 ILECs over the period 1996-2005 using stochastic frontier analysis with a time-varying inefficiency model. In addition, we conduct a comparison of indices between the stochastic frontier analysis and the Malmquist index method. The empirical results indicate that the sample of telecommunications firms has experienced deterioration in average productivity growth following the mergers. In addition, both approaches suggest that firms that do not merge underperform in terms of average productivity growth. Essay 3: This essay investigates whether the substitution of price cap regulation (PCR), along with other regulatory regimes, for traditional rate of return regulation (RRR) has had a measurable effect on productivity growth in the U.S. telecommunications industry. A stochastic frontier approach, which differs from previous studies, is employed to compute efficiency change, technological progress, and productivity growth for 25 LECs over the period 1988-1998. By examining the relationship between the change in productivity growth and regulatory regime variables, while controlling for other effects, we find that PCR and other regulatory regimes have a positive effect on productivity growth. However, only PCR has a significant and positive effect in both contemporaneous and lagged model specifications.

This thesis consists of three independent papers, ordered chronologically with respect to when they were initiated. Empirical research has established that there are large and persistent productivity differences among firms in narrowly defined industries (Bartelsman and Doms, 2000). Other studies, in particular Bernard and Jensen (1999), have shown the existence of a causal link running from ex-ante firm productivity to export decisions. Furthermore, exposure to trade has been found to enhance growth opportunities only for some firms, reallocating market shares and resources toward the more productive ones and contributing thus to aggregate productivity growth (Clerides, Lach and Tybout, 1998; Bernard and Jensen, 2004). These findings have led to the development of new theoretical models emphasizing the interaction between firm heterogeneity and fixed market entry costs in generating international trade and inducing aggregate productivity growth. The first and third chapters of this thesis extend the framework developed by Melitz (2003) to analyze the implications of  firm heterogeneity for old and new issues in international trade. The first paper studies the effect of trade liberalization between countries that differ in their relative endowment of skilled workers when growth-promoting R&amp;D activities are skill intensive with respect to goods production. In particular, the analysis focuses on the changes that falling trade costs induce on consumer welfare and on the number of firms active in the different markets. The third paper uses the heterogeneous firm framework to study the interaction between financial constraints and the market entry behavior of firms. It also analyzes whether the impact of trade liberalization on average firm productivity and on individual welfare is affected by the presence of credit frictions. The second chapter presents an empirical work that contributes to the recent but fast growing literature that studies how different institutions and their level of development affect countries comparative advantage. The analysis presented in this paper focuses on the role of legal and financial institution in driving the specialization in contract-intensive goods and on how the degree of institutional development interacts with the propensity of firms to vertical integrate with their suppliers. / Diss. Stockholm : Handelshögskolan i Stockholm, 2011

This study provides ex ante estimates of multi factor productivity (MFP) growth in the Saskatchewan agricultural sector on a crop by crop basis, using a time series of partial budgets from representative crop planning Guide. The study considers six major crops in Saskatchewan: spring wheat, durum wheat, feed barley, feed peas, large green lentils and canola. MFP growth is compared across crops, soil zones and cropping systems. Over the 1993-2013 period all six crops MFP grew at rates of over 2.56% per year. Feed peas and canola showed the fastest growth rates of 4.68% and 4.01%, respectively. The MFP growth of crops seeded on summer-fallow was slower than crops seeded into stubble using conventional tillage and zero tillage. The best soil zone for durum wheat and lentils, in term of productivity growth, was the Brown Soil zone; while for peas and canola, it is the Dark Brown Soil zone. Spring wheat and barley grown in different soil zones had very similar productivity gains.

Η παρούσα διπλωματική εργασία μελετά την επίδραση του κόστους περιστολής της ρύπανσης σε συγκεκριμένους κλάδους της ελληνικής βιομηχανίας, την χρονική περίοδο 1993-2006, στην παραγωγικότητά τους. Από θεωρητικής πλευράς εστιάζει στις αντικρουόμενες προσεγγίσεις της win-win υπόθεσης του Porter (1990,1991) και των Porter and Van der Linde (1995) με την νεοκλασική θεωρία, που είχε ως κύριους εκφραστές τους Jaffe και Palmer (1995,1997). Η μεθοδολογική προσέγγιση που ακολουθείται στηρίζεται στην μη παραμετρική μέθοδο της DEA με στόχο την εκτίμηση δεικτών παραγωγικότητας Malmquist (Malmquist Total Factor Productivity Index). Για την μελέτη της επίδρασης του κόστους περιστολής της ρύπανσης σε κλάδους της Ελληνικής βιομηχανίας ακολουθήθηκε η μεθοδολογία που αναπτύχθηκε απο τους Aiken et al., (2009) για τον διαχωρισμό και υπολογισμό μεταξύ regulated-unregulated συναρτήσεων ορίων παραγωγής. Στην εμπειρική εφαρμογή της μελέτης χρησιμοποιήθηκαν δεδομένα απο την ετήσια έρευνα βιομηχανίας της Ελληνικής Στατιστικής Υπηρεσίας σε 23 βιομηχανικούς κλάδους, σύμφωνα με την κωδικοποίηση ΣΤΑΚΟΔ 2003, και παρατηρείται συνολικά επουσιώδης αρνητική επίδραση τους κόστους περιστολής των ρύπων στην παραγωγικότητα. Πιο συγκεκριμένα, κλάδοι με υψηλή ενεργειακή ένταση φαίνεται να εμφανίζουν μηδενική επίδραση των περιβαλλοντικών δαπανών στην παραγωγικότητά τους με μοναδική εξαίρεση του κλάδου των ορυκτών-μετάλλων. / The passage of environmental regulation has been associated with a potential negative or positive effect on firm’s productivity. The present study studies the effect of pollution abatement activities on the productive efficiency of polluting industries in Greece over the period 1993-2006. A methodological approach based on Aiken et al., (2009) study have been developed in order to specify regulated and unregulated production frontiers and to determine the possible link between pollution abatement activities and sector’s productivity growth. Data derived form the Hellenic Statistical Authority has been used in order to estimate the possible association. Our results indicate, for the majority of the manufacturing industries, that increased rates of productivity growth have been simultaneously experienced with decreased rates of pollution abatement.

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