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on Efficiency and Productivity |
| By: | gert Bijnens; Joep Konings; Aaron Putseys |
| Abstract: | This paper identifies a firm-level Productivity J-curve induced by intangible investments. Using novel microdata on business-to-business transactions for Belgian firms, we construct a comprehensive measure of intangible in vestment covering software, R&D, design, training, and organizational capital. Our analysis shows that returns on intangibles substantially exceed those of traditional production factors, highlighting their central role in value creation. However, because intangible expenditures are rarely capitalized and are often recorded as intermediate inputs, they are not properly accounted for in conventional measures of total factor productivity (TFP). This misclassification creates systematic mismeasurement, whereby inputs are overstated relative to output in the short run, leading to an underestimation of TFP. Exploiting the lumpy nature of intangible expenditures within a difference-in-differences event-study framework, we document that such mismeasurement results in a persistent underestimation of TFP, by about 3% over a seven-year horizon. Given average measured TFP growth of 1% annually, this represents a substantial distortion. The bias is strongest among small, young, and low-capital intensive firms, reflecting slower absorption of intangible assets. By clarifying how intangible capital and emerging technologies such as AI systematically distort measured productivity, our findings provide new empirical insights into the productivity slowdown and the role of mismeasurement in modern economies. |
| Date: | 2025–11–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ete:ceswps:779815 |
| By: | Pinto, Bruno Chaves Morone; Fulginiti, Lilyan; Perrin, Richard |
| Keywords: | Production Economics |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361082 |
| By: | Ala-Kokko, Kristiina; Tack, Jesse B.; Yu, Jisang |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361097 |
| By: | Robson, Beatrice |
| Abstract: | Agrifood systems contribute one-third of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, about half of which originate from livestock through biological processes like enteric fermentation and manure. Anaerobic digesters are a technology that can reduce manure-based methane emissions, and in many cases convert the methane into energy that can be sold or used on-farm. Despite multiple supportive policies and subsidies, adoption remains limited. This study examines anaerobic digesters on United States dairy operations through the EPA-USDA AgSTAR database, exploring determinants to the emission abatement and the privately desirable energy outputs. Stochastic frontier production analysis is then used to model the efficiency of operational digesters, with implications for climate policy analysis and profitability studies for dairy operators. The average emissions abatement efficiency is found to be around 70%, and the average energy generation slightly lower, indicating opportunities for improvement both in terms of climate performance and cost-offsetting energy outputs. |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361181 |
| By: | Antonin Bergeaud; Ruveyda Nur Gozen; John Van Reenen |
| Abstract: | We introduce a methodology to measure cross-country trends in innovation capability - "technological trajectories" and implement this on a new rich dataset covering patents between 1836 and 2016 across multiple countries. Intuitively, trajectories are revealed by a country's sustained increases in patenting across multiple patent offices. We first describe the data patterns, showing the relative decline of the UK, and the rise first of the US and Germany, and then later of Japan and China. We then econometrically estimate trajectories on (i) the post-1902 period for France, Germany, Japan, the UK and US, and (ii) the post-1960 period for a wider sample of 40 countries. Our trajectories are strongly positively correlated with Total Factor Productivity growth, and also (but less strongly) associated with the growth of labour productivity and capital intensity. We show that future trajectories are predicted by a country’s initial levels of R&D, education and defence spending, classic drivers of innovation in modern growth theory. |
| Keywords: | patents, technical progress, economic history, innovation |
| Date: | 2026–01–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp2146 |
| By: | Babkin, Anton; Dunn, Richard A. |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361094 |
| By: | Tester, Colson; Shew, Aaron M.; Nalley, Lawton L.; Owens, Phillip R.; Connor, Lawson |
| Keywords: | Production Economics |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361085 |
| By: | Dewbre, Joe; Lenaerts, Bert; Mishra, Ashok K.; Pede, Valerien O. |
| Keywords: | Consumer/Household Economics, Labor and Human Capital |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:360960 |
| By: | Bloom, Nicholas; Kawakubo, Taka; Meng, Charlotte; Mizen, Paul; Riley, Rebecca; Senga, Tatsuro; Van Reenen, John |
| Abstract: | We link new forecast and management data on over 20, 000 firms to data on productivity in manufacturing and services. The panel survey was administered in the UK in July 2017 and November 2020, coinciding with two periods of considerable uncertainty from Brexit and Covid. We find that better-managed firms make more accurate forecasts for firm-level turnover and macro-level GDP. Uniquely, we show better-managed firms are also aware that they make more accurate forecasts and have greater confidence in their predictions. This highlights how superior forecasting ability enables well-managed firms to make improved operational and strategic choices. |
| Keywords: | management; productivity; expectations; uncertainty; forecasting |
| JEL: | L20 M20 O32 O33 |
| Date: | 2025–12–18 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:130291 |
| By: | Sanat, Lyazzat; Rejesus, Roderick M.; Woodley, Alex L. |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361099 |
| By: | Wang, Zhuoying; Sheng, Yu; Deng, Haiyan; Jin, Yanhong |
| Keywords: | Agribusiness |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:360628 |
| By: | Seoane Estruel, Luis; Lopez, Rigoberto A. |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea25:361098 |
| By: | Yusuf Emre Akgunduz; Gokce Karasoy Can; Elif Ozcan Tok |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the impact of pre-pandemic digitalization investments on pandemic performance, using data from Türkiye. We compare firms that adopted digital technologies before the pandemic with those that did not, employing a coarsened exact matching and difference-in-differences approach. Our first contribution is the development of a novel firm-level digitalization index, constructed using firm-to-firm trade data. The findings show that digitalized firms outperformed their non-digitalized pairs across key metrics, including assets, sales, employment, profitability, and export shares. In particular, digitalized firms have real assets, real sales, and employment that are 3 percent, 5 percent, and 2 percent higher, respectively. The impact of digitalization is even more pronounced in terms of profitability, return on assets, and export share, with higher levels ranging from 0.13 percentage points to 0.50 percentage points. To explain these results, we identify key channels through which digitalization enhanced firm performance which is our second contribution. Specifically, we show that digitalized firms expanded their trade networks—adding more partners and operating over greater distances—reduced labor churn rates, and improved productivity and competitiveness. Digitalization expands market reach, boosting the number of trading partners by 5 percent, while also increasing the average distance to trade partners by 2 percent more than less digitalized firms. |
| Keywords: | Digitalization, COVID-19, Coarsened Exact Matching, differences-in- differences, firm performance |
| JEL: | O33 C55 D22 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tcb:wpaper:2602 |