In this paper we characterize the extent of economic integration between Guangdong, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan (HKMT). We do not find, for the period of 1999 – 2003, consistent evidence that economic activity on the part of HKMT-funded companies contributed to productivity growth in Guangdong domestic manufacturing firms. Furthermore, HKMT-funded companies were less active than Guangdong dome...

In this paper we present new measures for the bias in an import price index due to outsourcing. The m easure is developed fi rst for a high ly simplif ied case for the purpose of conveying the rationale for the measure. It is then generalized, yielding a m eaasure that could b e used in empirical stu dies. Before taking up this bias measurement problem , however, we expl ain the m easurement co...

We study the ordinal content of assuming supermodularity, including conditions under which a binary relation can be represented by a supermodular function. When applied to revealed-preference relations, our results imply that supermodularity is some times not refutable: A consumer’s choices can be rationalized with a supermodular utility function if they can be rationalized with a monotonic uti...

We describe the evolution of productivity growth in a competitive industry with free entry and exit. The exogenous wage rate determines the firms’ engagement in labor productivity enhancing process innovation. There is a unique steady state of the industry dynamics, which is globally asymptotically stable. In the steady state, the number of active firms, their unit labor cost and supply depend ...

Three dimensions of the performance of firms in Ghana’s manufacturing sector are investigated in this paper: their technology and the importance of technical and allocative efficiency. We show that the diversity of factor choices is not due to a non-homothetic technology. Observable skills are not quantitatively important as determinants of productivity. Technical inefficiency is not lower in f...

This study presents the results of an extensive Monte Carlo experiment to compare di erent methods of e ciency analysis. In addition to traditional parametric-stochastic and nonparametric-deterministic methods recently developed robust nonparametric-stochastic methods are considered. The experimental design comprises a wide variety of situations with di erent returns-to-scale regimes, substitut...

This paper applies the concept of damage coefficients introduced in Houba and Kremers (2008) to provide an estimate of the cost of climate change in particular the cost of changes in mean regional temperature and precipitation to the fruit vegetation sector. We concentrate on the production of apples in the German ‘Alte Land’ region. The estimated cost of climate change on apple-growing in the ...

In this paper, “innovative intelligence–biased technological change” (IIBTC) is examined as an alternative to the traditional concept of skill-biased technological change (SBTC) as a source of increases in wage inequality. The innovative intelligence of ordinary or average workers is an important element in productivity and can be heterogeneous across workers. Because technologies are heterogen...

We develop a methodology to analyze capital misallocation (dispersion in static marginal products) measure the contributions of technological/informational frictions and a rich class of firm-specific factors. An application to Chinese manufacturing firms reveals that adjustment costs and uncertainty, while significant, generate only a modest amount of MPK dispersion, which stems largely from ot...

This article examines learning-by-doing that is specific not just to individual firms but to pairs of firms working together in a contracting relationship. Using data from the oil and gas industry, I find that the productivity of an oil production company and its drilling contractor increases with their joint experience. This learning is relationship-specific: drilling rigs cannot fully appropr...