IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bca/bocawp/19-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Productivity Slowdown in Canada: An ICT Phenomenon?

Author

Listed:
  • Jeffrey Mollins
  • Pierre St-Amant

Abstract

We ask whether a weaker contribution of information and communication technologies (ICT) to productivity growth could account for the productivity slowdown observed in Canada since the early 2000s. To answer this question, we consider several methods capturing channels through which ICT could affect aggregate productivity growth. This includes an approach “à la Cette et al. (2015)” that focuses on the use of ICT capital. We also examine two-sector models including a simple approach with use and production effects, and an approach “à la Oulton (2012)” that highlights the role of relatively weak growth in ICT prices. However, Oulton’s approach is based on strong assumptions about the structure of the economy, some of which are clearly inconsistent with Canadian data. We therefore propose a different model based on assumptions that are less restrictive but that still capture various channels (production, capital deepening, price effects). Our results indicate that ICT continues to contribute to productivity growth, but that this contribution has declined and accounts for part of the productivity slowdown. However, the slowdowns in productivity and in the contribution of ICT do not seem to have the same timing. While productivity slowed in the early 2000s, ICT contribution does not appear to have fallen until around the Great Recession. This prompts the conclusion that while ICT had little to no role in the initial productivity slowdown, it has been a major determinant of the subdued productivity growth since around the recession.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeffrey Mollins & Pierre St-Amant, 2019. "The Productivity Slowdown in Canada: An ICT Phenomenon?," Staff Working Papers 19-2, Bank of Canada.
  • Handle: RePEc:bca:bocawp:19-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.bankofcanada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/swp2019-2.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David M. Byrne & John G. Fernald & Marshall B. Reinsdorf, 2016. "Does the United States Have a Productivity Slowdown or a Measurement Problem?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 47(1 (Spring), pages 109-182.
    2. Chad Syverson, 2017. "Challenges to Mismeasurement Explanations for the US Productivity Slowdown," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 31(2), pages 165-186, Spring.
    3. Blanchard, Olivier & Lorenzoni, Guido & L’Huillier, Jean-Paul, 2017. "Short-run effects of lower productivity growth. A twist on the secular stagnation hypothesis," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 639-649.
    4. Oulton, Nicholas, 2012. "Long term implications of the ICT revolution: Applying the lessons of growth theory and growth accounting," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 29(5), pages 1722-1736.
    5. Wulong Gu, 2018. "Accounting for Slower Productivity Growth in the Canadian Business Sector after 2000: The Role of Capital Measurement Issues," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 34, pages 21-39, Spring.
    6. Andrew Sharpe & Eric Thomson, 2010. "Insights into Canada’s Abysmal Post-2000 Productivity Performance from Decompositions of Labour Productivity Growth by Industry and Province," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 20, pages 48-67, Fall.
    7. David Autor & David Dorn & Lawrence F Katz & Christina Patterson & John Van Reenen, 2020. "The Fall of the Labor Share and the Rise of Superstar Firms [“Automation and New Tasks: How Technology Displaces and Reinstates Labor”]," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(2), pages 645-709.
    8. Ryan A. Decker & John Haltiwanger & Ron S. Jarmin & Javier Miranda, 2017. "Declining Dynamism, Allocative Efficiency, and the Productivity Slowdown," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 322-326, May.
    9. Gilbert Cette & Christian Clerc & Lea Bresson, 2015. "Contribution of ICT Diffusion to Labour Productivity Growth: The United States, Canada, the Eurozone, and the United Kingdom, 1970-2013," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 28, pages 81-88, Spring.
    10. Ricardo de Avillez, 2012. "Sectoral Contributions to Labour Productivity Growth: Does the Choice of Decomposition Formula Matter?," CSLS Research Reports 2012-09, Centre for the Study of Living Standards.
    11. Dave Byrne & Carol Corrado, 2017. "ICT Prices and ICT Services: What Do They Tell Us About Productivity and Technology," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 33, pages 150-181, Fall.
    12. Bergeaud, A. & Cette, G. & Lecat, R., 2015. "Productivity trends from 1890 to 2012 in advanced countries," Rue de la Banque, Banque de France, issue 07, June..
    13. Antonin Bergeaud & Gilbert Cette & Rémy Lecat, 2016. "Productivity Trends in Advanced Countries between 1890 and 2012," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 62(3), pages 420-444, September.
    14. Pierre St-Amant & David Tessier, 2018. "Firm Dynamics and Multifactor Productivity: An Empirical Exploration," Staff Working Papers 18-15, Bank of Canada.
    15. Marshall Reinsdorf, 2015. "Measuring Industry Contributions to Labour Productivity Change: A New Formula in a Chained Fisher Index Framework," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 28, pages 3-26, Spring.
    16. Baldwin, John R. & Liu, Huju & Tanguay, Marc, 2015. "An Update on Depreciation Rates for the Canadian Productivity Accounts," The Canadian Productivity Review 2015039e, Statistics Canada, Economic Analysis Division.
    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. Alejandra Bellatin & Stephanie Houle, 2021. "Overlooking the online world: Does mismeasurement of the digital economy explain the productivity slowdown?," Staff Analytical Notes 2021-10, Bank of Canada.
    2. Farah Omran & Jeremy Kronick, 2019. "Productivity and the Financial Services Sector – How to Achieve New Heights," C.D. Howe Institute Commentary, C.D. Howe Institute, issue 555, October.
    3. Tang, Jianmin & Wang, Weimin, 2020. "Technological frontier, technical efficiency and the post-2000 productivity slowdown in Canada," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 12-25.

    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. Ian Goldin & Pantelis Koutroumpis & François Lafond & Julian Winkler, 2024. "Why Is Productivity Slowing Down?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 62(1), pages 196-268, March.
    2. Alexander Murray, 2017. "What Explains the Post-2004 U.S.Productivity Slowdown?," CSLS Research Reports 2017-05, Centre for the Study of Living Standards.
    3. Gilbert Cette & Aurélien Devillard & Vincenzo Spiezia, 2022. "Growth Factors in Developed Countries: A 1960–2019 Growth Accounting Decomposition," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 64(2), pages 159-185, June.
    4. Jorge Antunes & Goodness C. Aye & Rangan Gupta & Peter Wanke & Yong Tan, 2020. "Endogenous Long-Term Productivity Performance in Advanced Countries: A Novel Two-Dimensional Fuzzy-Monte Carlo Approach," Working Papers 2020111, University of Pretoria, Department of Economics.
    5. David Byrne & Stephen D. Oliner & Daniel E. Sichel, 2017. "Prices of high-tech products, mismeasurement, and the pace of innovation," Business Economics, Palgrave Macmillan;National Association for Business Economics, vol. 52(2), pages 103-113, April.
    6. Wulong Gu & Michael Willox, 2018. "Productivity Growth in Canada and the United States: Recent Industry Trends and Potential Explanations," International Productivity Monitor, Centre for the Study of Living Standards, vol. 35, pages 73-94, Fall.
    7. Tang, Jianmin & Wang, Weimin, 2020. "Technological frontier, technical efficiency and the post-2000 productivity slowdown in Canada," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 12-25.
    8. Kovács, Olivér, 2017. "Az ipar 4.0 komplexitása - I [The complexity of industry 4.0 - Part 1]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(7), pages 823-851.
    9. Nicholas Crafts, 2017. "Is Slow Economic Growth the ‘New Normal’ for Europe?," Atlantic Economic Journal, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 45(3), pages 283-297, September.
    10. Evguenia Bessonova & Anna Tsvetkova, 2022. "Do Productivity Laggards Ever Catch Up With Leaders?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 68(S1), pages 71-107, April.
    11. Elstner, Steffen & Feld, Lars P. & Schmidt, Christoph M., 2018. "The German productivity paradox: Facts and explanations," Ruhr Economic Papers 767, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    12. Charles Hulten & Leonard I. Nakamura, 2020. "Expanded GDP for Welfare Measurement in the 21st Century," NBER Chapters, in: Measuring and Accounting for Innovation in the Twenty-First Century, pages 19-59, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Diane Coyle & Jen‐Chung Mei, 2023. "Diagnosing the UK productivity slowdown: which sectors matter and why?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 90(359), pages 813-850, July.
    14. 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.
    15. J. David Brown & Gustavo A. Crespi & Leonardo Iacovone & Luca Marcolin, 2018. "Decomposing firm-level productivity growth and assessing its determinants: evidence from the Americas," The Journal of Technology Transfer, Springer, vol. 43(6), pages 1571-1606, December.
    16. John G. Fernald & Robert E. Hall & James H. Stock & Mark W. Watson, 2017. "The Disappointing Recovery of Output after 2009," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 48(1 (Spring), pages 1-81.
    17. 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.
    18. Gene M. Grossman & Elhanan Helpman & Ezra Oberfield & Thomas Sampson, 2017. "The productivity slowdown and the declining labor share: a neoclassical exploration," CEP Discussion Papers dp1504, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    19. Stefan Schweikl & Robert Obermaier, 2020. "Lessons from three decades of IT productivity research: towards a better understanding of IT-induced productivity effects," Management Review Quarterly, Springer, vol. 70(4), pages 461-507, November.
    20. Marianna Epicoco, 2021. "Technological Revolutions and Economic Development: Endogenous and Exogenous Fluctuations," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 12(3), pages 1437-1461, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Productivity;

    JEL classification:

    • D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Cost; Capital; Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity; Capacity
    • O4 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity
    • O41 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - One, Two, and Multisector Growth Models
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:bca:bocawp:19-2. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bocgvca.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.