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Efficiency and Global Scale Characteristics on the “No Free Lunch” Assumption Only

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  • Victor Podinovski

Abstract

In a production technology, the type of returns to scale (RTS) associated with an efficient decision making unit (DMU) is indicative of the direction of marginal rescaling that the DMU should undertake in order to improve its productivity. In this paper a concept of global returns to scale (GRS) is developed as an indicator of the direction in which the most productive scale size (MPSS) of an efficient DMU is achieved. The GRS classes are useful in assisting strategic decisions like those involving mergers of units or splitting into smaller firms. The two characterisations, RTS and GRS, are the same in a convex technology but generally different in a non-convex one. It is shown that, in a non-convex technology, the well-known method of testing RTS proposed by Färe et al. is in fact testing for GRS and not RTS. Further, while there are three types of RTS: constant, decreasing and increasing (CRS, DRS and IRS, respectively), the classification according to GRS includes the fourth type of sub-constant GRS, which describes a DMU able to achieve its MPSS by both reducing and increasing the scale of operations. The notion of GRS is applicable to a wide range of technologies, including the free disposal hull (FDH) and all polyhedral technologies used in data envelopment analysis (DEA). Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 2004

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  • Victor Podinovski, 2004. "Efficiency and Global Scale Characteristics on the “No Free Lunch” Assumption Only," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 22(3), pages 227-257, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jproda:v:22:y:2004:i:3:p:227-257
    DOI: 10.1007/s11123-004-7575-z
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    2. Zafar, Sohail & Ahmed, Vaqar, 2009. "External scale economies in manufacturing sector of Pakistan: a comparison of large scale manufacturing sector of Sindh and Punjab," MPRA Paper 17665, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Cesaroni, Giovanni & Kerstens, Kristiaan & Van de Woestyne, Ignace, 2017. "Global and local scale characteristics in convex and nonconvex nonparametric technologies: A first empirical exploration," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 259(2), pages 576-586.
    4. Kristiaan Kerstens & Ignace Van de Woestyne, 2021. "Cost functions are nonconvex in the outputs when the technology is nonconvex: convexification is not harmless," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 305(1), pages 81-106, October.
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    6. Cesaroni, Giovanni & Giovannola, Daniele, 2015. "Average-cost efficiency and optimal scale sizes in non-parametric analysis," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 242(1), pages 121-133.
    7. Giovanni Cesaroni & Kristiaan Kerstens & Ignace Van de Woestyne, 2017. "Estimating scale economies in non-convex production models," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 68(11), pages 1442-1451, November.

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