IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/telpol/v40y2016i5p471-484.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Are intangibles more productive in ICT-intensive industries? Evidence from EU countries

Author

Listed:
  • Chen, Wen
  • Niebel, Thomas
  • Saam, Marianne

Abstract

There is much firm-level evidence that maximising productivity benefits from investments in information and communication technologies (ICT) requires complementary investments in organisational structures, employee training, and other intangible assets. Yet convincing macro-level analysis to quantify the importance of this effect was not possible until industry-level data on investment in intangibles were developed. With such data now available for 10 European countries, this research shows that the output elasticity of intangible capital is stronger in more ICT-intensive industries. This suggests that intangible capital and ICT capital are complements in production.

Suggested Citation

  • Chen, Wen & Niebel, Thomas & Saam, Marianne, 2016. "Are intangibles more productive in ICT-intensive industries? Evidence from EU countries," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(5), pages 471-484.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:telpol:v:40:y:2016:i:5:p:471-484
    DOI: 10.1016/j.telpol.2015.09.010
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308596115001524
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.telpol.2015.09.010?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Erik Brynjolfsson & Loren Hitt & Shinkyu Yang, 2002. "Intangible Assets: How the Interaction of Computers and Organizational Structure Affects Stock Market Valuations," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 33(1), pages 137-198.
    2. Mariela Dal Borgo & Peter Goodridge & Jonathan Haskel & Annarosa Pesole, 2013. "Productivity and Growth in UK Industries: An Intangible Investment Approach," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 75(6), pages 806-834, December.
    3. Susanto Basu & John G. Fernald & Nicholas Oulton & Sylaja Srinivasan, 2003. "The Case of the Missing Productivity Growth: Or, Does Information Technology Explain why Productivity Accelerated in the US but not the UK?," NBER Working Papers 10010, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Guy Michaels & Ashwini Natraj & John Van Reenen, 2010. "Has ICT Polarized Skill Demand? Evidence from Eleven Countries over 25 Years," CEP Discussion Papers dp0987, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    5. Haskel, J & Goodridge, P & Wallis, G, 2012. "UK Innovation Index: productivity and growth in UK industries," Working Papers 9786, Imperial College, London, Imperial College Business School.
    6. Felix Roth & Anna-Elisabeth Thum, 2022. "Intangible Capital and Labor Productivity Growth: Panel Evidence for the EU from 1998–2005," Contributions to Economics, in: Intangible Capital and Growth, chapter 0, pages 101-128, Springer.
    7. Carol Corrado & Charles Hulten & Daniel Sichel, 2005. "Measuring Capital and Technology: An Expanded Framework," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring Capital in the New Economy, pages 11-46, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Kevin J. Fox & Thomas Niebel & Mary O'Mahony & Marianne Saam, 2017. "The Contribution of Intangible Assets to Sectoral Productivity Growth in the EU," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 63, pages 49-67, February.
    9. Kyoji Fukao & Tsutomu Miyagawa & Kentaro Mukai & Yukio Shinoda & Konomi Tonogi, 2009. "Intangible Investment In Japan: Measurement And Contribution To Economic Growth," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 55(3), pages 717-736, September.
    10. Timothy F. Bresnahan & Erik Brynjolfsson & Lorin M. Hitt, 2002. "Information Technology, Workplace Organization, and the Demand for Skilled Labor: Firm-Level Evidence," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(1), pages 339-376.
    11. Leonard I. Nakamura, 2010. "Intangible Assets And National Income Accounting," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 56(s1), pages 135-155, June.
    12. Susanto Basu & John G. Fernald & Nicholas Oulton & Sylaja Srinivasan, 2004. "The Case of the Missing Productivity Growth, or Does Information Technology Explain Why Productivity Accelerated in the United States but Not in the United Kingdom?," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2003, Volume 18, pages 9-82, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Antonio Ciccone & Elias Papaioannou, 2010. "Estimating Cross-Industry Cross-Country Models Using Benchmark Industry Characteristics," Working Papers 504, Barcelona School of Economics.
    14. Ackerberg, Daniel & Lanier Benkard, C. & Berry, Steven & Pakes, Ariel, 2007. "Econometric Tools for Analyzing Market Outcomes," Handbook of Econometrics, in: J.J. Heckman & E.E. Leamer (ed.), Handbook of Econometrics, edition 1, volume 6, chapter 63, Elsevier.
    15. Haskel, J & Corrado, C & Jona-Lasinio, C & Iommi, M, 2012. "Intangible capital and growth in advanced economies: measurement methods and comparative results," Working Papers 9913, Imperial College, London, Imperial College Business School.
    16. Carol Corrado & Jonathan Haskel & Cecilia Jona-Lasinio, 2017. "Knowledge Spillovers, ICT and Productivity Growth," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 79(4), pages 592-618, August.
    17. Dale W. Jorgenson & Marcel P. Timmer, 2011. "Structural Change in Advanced Nations: A New Set of Stylised Facts," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 113(1), pages 1-29, March.
    18. Erik Brynjolfsson & Lorin M. Hitt, 2003. "Computing Productivity: Firm-Level Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(4), pages 793-808, November.
    19. Mary O'Mahony & Marcel P. Timmer, 2009. "Output, Input and Productivity Measures at the Industry Level: The EU KLEMS Database," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(538), pages 374-403, June.
    20. Carol Corrado & John Haltiwanger & Daniel Sichel, 2005. "Measuring Capital in the New Economy," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number corr05-1.
    21. Carol Corrado & Jonathan Haskel & Cecilia Jona-Lasinio & Massimiliano Iommi, 2013. "Innovation and intangible investment in Europe, Japan, and the United States," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 29(2), pages 261-286, SUMMER.
    22. Olley, G Steven & Pakes, Ariel, 1996. "The Dynamics of Productivity in the Telecommunications Equipment Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 64(6), pages 1263-1297, November.
    23. Carol Coorado & Jonathan Haskel & Cecilia Iona Lasinio & Massimiliano Iommi, 2012. "Intangible Capital and Growth Strategies for Advanced Economies: Measurement and Comparative Results," Working Papers LuissLab 12101, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, LUISS Guido Carli.
    24. Nicholas Bloom & Raffaella Sadun & John Van Reenen, 2012. "Americans Do IT Better: US Multinationals and the Productivity Miracle," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 167-201, February.
    25. Erik Brynjolfsson & Lorin M. Hitt, 2000. "Beyond Computation: Information Technology, Organizational Transformation and Business Performance," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 23-48, Fall.
    26. Corrado, Carol & Haltiwanger, John & Sichel, Daniel (ed.), 2005. "Measuring Capital in the New Economy," National Bureau of Economic Research Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226116129.
    27. Haskel, J & Corrado, C & Jona-Lasinio, C & Iommi, M, 2013. "Innovation and intangible investment in Europe, Japan and the US," Working Papers 11139, Imperial College, London, Imperial College Business School.
    28. Bronwyn H. Hall & Francesca Lotti & Jacques Mairesse, 2013. "Evidence on the impact of R&D and ICT investments on innovation and productivity in Italian firms," Economics of Innovation and New Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 22(3), pages 300-328, April.
    29. Kevin J. Stiroh, 2002. "Information Technology and the U.S. Productivity Revival: What Do the Industry Data Say?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1559-1576, December.
    30. Hatice Ozer Balli & Bent Sørensen, 2013. "Interaction effects in econometrics," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 583-603, August.
    31. Haskel, Jonathan & Iommi, Massimiliano, 2012. "Intangible Capital and Growth in Advanced Economies: Measurement and Comparative Results," CEPR Discussion Papers 9061, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    32. Carol Corrado & John Haltiwanger & Daniel Sichel, 2005. "Introduction to "Measuring Capital in the New Economy"," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring Capital in the New Economy, pages 1-10, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    33. Carol A. Corrado & Charles R. Hulten, 2010. "How Do You Measure a "Technological Revolution"?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 99-104, May.
    34. Bart van Ark & Mary O'Mahoney & Marcel P. Timmer, 2008. "The Productivity Gap between Europe and the United States: Trends and Causes," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 22(1), pages 25-44, Winter.
    35. James Levinsohn & Amil Petrin, 2003. "Estimating Production Functions Using Inputs to Control for Unobservables," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 70(2), pages 317-341.
    36. Dale W. Jorgenson & Marcel P. Timmer, "undated". "Structural Change in Advanced Nations," Working Paper 13525, Harvard University OpenScholar.
    37. Guy Michaels & Ashwini Natraj & John Van Reenen, 2014. "Has ICT Polarized Skill Demand? Evidence from Eleven Countries over Twenty-Five Years," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(1), pages 60-77, March.
    38. van Ark, Bart & Hao, Janet X. & Corrado, Carol & Hulten, Charles, 2009. "Measuring intangible capital and its contribution to economic growth in Europe," EIB Papers 3/2009, European Investment Bank, Economics Department.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hyunbae Chun & M. Ishaq Nadiri, 2016. "Intangible Investment and Changing Sources of Growth in Korea," The Japanese Economic Review, Japanese Economic Association, vol. 67(1), pages 50-76, March.
    2. Roth, Felix, 2019. "Intangible Capital and Labour Productivity Growth: A Review of the Literature," Hamburg Discussion Papers in International Economics 4, University of Hamburg, Department of Economics.
    3. Carol Corrado & Jonathan Haskel & Cecilia Jona-Lasinio, 2017. "Knowledge Spillovers, ICT and Productivity Growth," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 79(4), pages 592-618, August.
    4. Peter Bauer & Igor Fedotenkov & Aurelien Genty & Issam Hallak & Peter Harasztosi & David Martinez Turegano & David Nguyen & Nadir Preziosi & Ana Rincon-Aznar & Miguel Sanchez Martinez, 2020. "Productivity in Europe: Trends and drivers in a service-based economy," JRC Research Reports JRC119785, Joint Research Centre.
    5. Li, Qing & Wu, Yanrui, 2020. "Intangible capital, ICT and sector growth in China," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(1).
    6. Wen Chen, 2018. "Cross‐Country Income Differences Revisited: Accounting for the Role of Intangible Capital," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 64(3), pages 626-648, September.
    7. Siedschlag, Iulia & Lawless, Martina & Di Ubaldo, Mattia, 2017. "Investment in knowledge-based capital and its contribution to productivity growth: a review of international and Irish evidence," Research Series, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), number BKMNEXT336.
    8. Kevin J. Fox & Peter Goodridge & Jonathan Haskel & Gavin Wallis, 2017. "Spillovers from R&D and Other Intangible Investment: Evidence from UK Industries," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 63, pages 22-48, February.
    9. Thum-Thysen, Anna & Voigt, Peter & Weiss, Christoph, 2021. "Complementarities in capital formation and production: Tangible and intangible assets across Europe," EIB Working Papers 2021/12, European Investment Bank (EIB).
    10. HOSONO Kaoru & MIYAKAWA Daisuke & TAKIZAWA Miho & YAMANOUCHI Kenta, 2016. "Complementarity and Substitutability between Tangible and Intangible Capital: Evidence from Japanese firm-level data," Discussion papers 16024, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    11. Nonnis, Alberto & Bounfour, Ahmed & Kim, Keungoui, 2023. "Knowledge spillovers and intangible complementarities: Empirical case of European countries," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(1).
    12. Marek Pekarčík & Júlia Ďurčová & Jozef Glova, 2022. "Intangible ICT and Their Importance within Global Value Chains: An Empirical Analysis Based on Longitudinal Data Regression," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-14, April.
    13. Roth, Felix & Sen, Ali & Rammer, Christian, 2021. "Intangible Capital and Firm-Level Productivity – Evidence from Germany," Hamburg Discussion Papers in International Economics 9, University of Hamburg, Department of Economics.
    14. Kevin J. Fox & Thomas Niebel & Mary O'Mahony & Marianne Saam, 2017. "The Contribution of Intangible Assets to Sectoral Productivity Growth in the EU," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 63, pages 49-67, February.
    15. Cristiano Antonelli & Gianluca Orsatti & Guido Pialli, 2023. "The knowledge-intensive direction of technological change," Eurasian Business Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 13(1), pages 1-27, March.
    16. Carolina Hintzmann & Josep Lladós-Masllorens & Raul Ramos, 2021. "Intangible Assets and Labor Productivity Growth," Economies, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-21, May.
    17. Iacovone, Leonardo & Pereira-López, Mariana & Schiffbauer, Marc, 2023. "Competition makes IT better: Evidence on when firms use IT more effectively," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(8).
    18. Felix Roth, 2022. "The Productivity Puzzle: A Critical Assessment and an Outlook on the COVID-19 Crisis," Contributions to Economics, in: Intangible Capital and Growth, chapter 0, pages 1-16, Springer.
    19. Szalavetz, Andrea, 2012. "Az immateriális beruházások és a nem közvetlenül a termelésben foglalkoztatottak szerepe a gazdasági felzárkózásban [The role intangible investments and non-production workers play in economic catc," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(11), pages 1187-1206.
    20. Hyunbae CHUN & MIYAGAWA Tsutomu & Hak Kil PYO & TONOGI Konomi, 2015. "Do Intangibles Contribute to Productivity Growth in East Asian Countries? Evidence from Japan and Korea," Discussion papers 15055, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Intangible capital; ICT; Economic growth; Labour productivity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E22 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Investment; Capital; Intangible Capital; Capacity
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:telpol:v:40:y:2016:i:5:p:471-484. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/30471/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.