IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/orisre/v11y2000i2p159-176.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Production of Information Services: A Firm-Level Analysis of Information Systems Budgets

Author

Listed:
  • Vijay Gurbaxani

    (Center for Research on Information Technology and Organizations, Graduate School of Management, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697)

  • Nigel Melville

    (Center for Research on Information Technology and Organizations, Graduate School of Management, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697)

  • Kenneth Kraemer

    (Center for Research on Information Technology and Organizations, Graduate School of Management, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697)

Abstract

Previous research has demonstrated that the production of information services can be characterized at the aggregate economy-wide level by the Cobb-Douglas production function. However, the underlying production process at the firm level has not yet been ascertained. The objective of this paper is to determine the form of the production process for information systems services at the firm level by conducting an empirical analysis of IS budget data. The production of information services is modeled using a production function with two inputs, hardware and personnel. We estimate various econometric specifications to determine several characteristics of the provision of information services, including the allocation of the information systems budget to its two largest components—hardware and personnel—and its implications for the form of the production function. After controlling for industry sector, we find that the ratio of personnel to hardware is independent of scale, which indicates a homothetic production function. We also find that the ratio of factor shares is constant with time, consistent with the Cobb-Douglas production function.We conclude that the underlying form of the production function is the same at the level of both the firm and the economy. Our analysis demonstrates how the application of production theory to the production of information services can yield useful insights from both a theoretical and managerial perspective.

Suggested Citation

  • Vijay Gurbaxani & Nigel Melville & Kenneth Kraemer, 2000. "The Production of Information Services: A Firm-Level Analysis of Information Systems Budgets," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 11(2), pages 159-176, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:orisre:v:11:y:2000:i:2:p:159-176
    DOI: 10.1287/isre.11.2.159.11779
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/isre.11.2.159.11779
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/isre.11.2.159.11779?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fisher, Franklin M, 1971. "Aggregate Production Functions and the Explanation of Wages: A Simulation Experiment," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 53(4), pages 305-325, November.
    2. H. S. Houthakker, 1955. "The Pareto Distribution and the Cobb-Douglas Production Function in Activity Analysis," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 23(1), pages 27-31.
    3. Vijay Gurbaxani & Haim Mendelson, 1990. "An Integrative Model of Information Systems Spending Growth," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 1(1), pages 23-46, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Dolfsma, Wilfred, 2005. "Towards a dynamic (Schumpeterian) welfare economics," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 69-82, February.
    2. Dennis O. Kundisch & Neeraj Mittal & Barrie R. Nault, 2014. "Research Commentary —Using Income Accounting as the Theoretical Basis for Measuring IT Productivity," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 25(3), pages 449-467, September.
    3. Saggi Nevo & Michael Wade & Wade D. Cook, 2010. "An empirical study of IT as a factor of production: The case of Net-enabled IT assets," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 323-335, July.

    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. Jesus Felipe & John McCombie, 2010. "On Accounting Identities, Simulation Experiments and Aggregate Production Functions: A Cautionary Tale for (Neoclassical) Growth Theorists," Chapters, in: Mark Setterfield (ed.), Handbook of Alternative Theories of Economic Growth, chapter 9, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Jesus Felipe & J. S. L. McCombie, 2005. "How Sound are the Foundations of the Aggregate Production Function?," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 31(3), pages 467-488, Summer.
    3. Jesus Felipe & John S.L. McCombie, 2013. "The Aggregate Production Function and the Measurement of Technical Change," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1975.
    4. Maya Eden, 2017. "Misallocation and the Distribution of Global Volatility," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(2), pages 592-622, February.
    5. David Rezza Baqaee & Emmanuel Farhi, 2019. "The Macroeconomic Impact of Microeconomic Shocks: Beyond Hulten's Theorem," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(4), pages 1155-1203, July.
    6. Wu, JunJie & Zilberman, David & Babcock, Bruce A., 2001. "Environmental and Distributional Impacts of Conservation Targeting Strategies," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 333-350, May.
    7. Kronenberg, Tobias, 2010. "Finding common ground between ecological economics and post-Keynesian economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(7), pages 1488-1494, May.
    8. Taghizadeh-Hesary, Farhad & Rasoulinezhad, Ehsan & Shahbaz, Muhammad & Vinh Vo, Xuan, 2021. "How energy transition and power consumption are related in Asian economies with different income levels?," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 237(C).
    9. Ezra Oberfield & Devesh Raval, 2021. "Micro Data and Macro Technology," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(2), pages 703-732, March.
    10. Stern, David I., 1997. "Limits to substitution and irreversibility in production and consumption: A neoclassical interpretation of ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 197-215, June.
    11. Mangin, Sephorah, 2017. "A theory of production, matching, and distribution," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 172(C), pages 376-409.
    12. YOSHIKAWA Hiroshi, 2013. "Stochastic Macro-equilibrium and Microfoundations for Keynesian Economics," Discussion papers 13039, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    13. Johannes Boehm, 2020. "The Impact of Contract Enforcement Costs on Outsourcing and Aggregate Productivity," SciencePo Working papers hal-03566762, HAL.
    14. Robert M. Solow, 1967. "Some Recent Developments in the Theory of Production," NBER Chapters, in: The Theory and Empirical Analysis of Production, pages 25-53, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Johannes Boehm & Ezra Oberfield, 2020. "Misallocation in the Market for Inputs: Enforcement and the Organization of Production," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(4), pages 2007-2058.
    16. Avi J. Cohen, 2003. "Retrospectives: Whatever Happened to the Cambridge Capital Theory Controversies?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 17(1), pages 199-214, Winter.
    17. Tjalling C. Koopmans, 1977. "Examples of Production Relations Based on Microdata," International Economic Association Series, in: G. C. Harcourt (ed.), The Microeconomic Foundations of Macroeconomics, chapter 5, pages 144-178, Palgrave Macmillan.
    18. Truchon, Michel, 1988. "Programmation mathématique et théorie économique," L'Actualité Economique, Société Canadienne de Science Economique, vol. 64(2), pages 143-156, juin.
    19. Torstein Bye & Erling Holmϕy, 2010. "Removing Policy-based Comparative Advantage for Energy Intensive Production: Necessary Adjustments of the Real Exchange Rate and Industry Structure," The Energy Journal, , vol. 31(1), pages 177-198, January.
    20. Youssef Benzarti & Jarkko Harju, 2021. "Using Payroll Tax Variation to Unpack the Black Box of Firm-Level Production," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(5), pages 2737-2764.

    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:inm:orisre:v:11:y:2000:i:2:p:159-176. 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: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    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.