IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/nbp/nbpmis/73.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

On the measurement of technological progress across countries

Author

Abstract

We construct 14 alternative measures of technological progress for 19 OECD countries over the period 1970–2000, distinguishing between measures of productivity gains actually obtained in a given country (TFP growth, Malmquist index) and technological progress at the world technology frontier (potential TFP growth, the “frontier shift” index). We then compare these measures according to a range of characteristics, shedding light on some of their relative weaknesses and strengths. We find that these characteristics are sensitive to the precision of estimates of the world technology frontier, and then we demonstrate that this precision can be increased substantially by allowing for imperfect substitutability between unskilled and skilled labor and using US state-level data apart from cross-country data for estimating the world technology frontier. Because none of the 14 measures dominates all others on all dimensions, we conclude that the choice of appropriate measurement method should be suited to the question addressed in each particular study.

Suggested Citation

  • Jakub Growiec, 2010. "On the measurement of technological progress across countries," NBP Working Papers 73, Narodowy Bank Polski.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbp:nbpmis:73
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://static.nbp.pl/publikacje/materialy-i-studia/73_en.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Leopold Simar & Paul Wilson, 2000. "A general methodology for bootstrapping in non-parametric frontier models," Journal of Applied Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(6), pages 779-802.
    2. Growiec, Jakub, 2008. "Productivity differences across OECD countries, 1970–2000: the world technology frontier revisited," MPRA Paper 11605, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Scott L. Baier & Sean Mulholland & Robert Tamura & Chad Turner, 2004. "Income and education of the states of the United States: 1840–2000," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2004-31, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    4. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for Cross-Country Income Differences," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 9, pages 679-741, Elsevier.
    5. Antràs Pol, 2004. "Is the U.S. Aggregate Production Function Cobb-Douglas? New Estimates of the Elasticity of Substitution," The B.E. Journal of Macroeconomics, De Gruyter, vol. 4(1), pages 1-36, April.
    6. Jose Zofio, 2007. "Malmquist productivity index decompositions: a unifying framework," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(18), pages 2371-2387.
    7. Susanto Basu & David N. Weil, 1998. "Appropriate Technology and Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 113(4), pages 1025-1054.
    8. Alexandra Daskovska & Léopold Simar & Sébastien Bellegem, 2010. "Forecasting the Malmquist productivity index," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 33(2), pages 97-107, April.
    9. Angel de la Fuente & Rafael Doménech, 2006. "Human Capital in Growth Regressions: How Much Difference Does Data Quality Make?," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 4(1), pages 1-36, March.
    10. Miguel A. León-Ledesma & Peter McAdam & Alpo Willman, 2010. "Identifying the Elasticity of Substitution with Biased Technical Change," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(4), pages 1330-1357, September.
    11. Ray, Subhash C & Desli, Evangelia, 1997. "Productivity Growth, Technical Progress, and Efficiency Change in Industrialized Countries: Comment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(5), pages 1033-1039, December.
    12. repec:bla:obuest:v:61:y:1999:i:4:p:455-87 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Jakub Growiec & Anna Pajor & Dorota Gorniak & Artur Predki, 2015. "The shape of aggregate production functions: evidence from estimates of the World Technology Frontier," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 46(4), pages 299-326.
    14. repec:dgr:rugggd:200363 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Thijs ten Raa & Pierre Mohnen, 2009. "Neoclassical Growth Accounting and Frontier Analysis: A Synthesis," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Input–Output Economics: Theory And Applications Featuring Asian Economies, chapter 19, pages 347-370, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    16. Daniel Cohen & Marcelo Soto, 2007. "Growth and human capital: good data, good results," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 12(1), pages 51-76, March.
    17. Kydland, Finn E & Prescott, Edward C, 1982. "Time to Build and Aggregate Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(6), pages 1345-1370, November.
    18. Barro, Robert J & Lee, Jong-Wha, 2001. "International Data on Educational Attainment: Updates and Implications," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 53(3), pages 541-563, July.
    19. Chad Turner & Robert Tamura & Sean Mulholland, 2013. "How important are human capital, physical capital and total factor productivity for determining state economic growth in the United States, 1840–2000?," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 319-371, December.
    20. Timmer, Marcel P. & Ypma, Gerard & Ark, Bart van der, 2003. "IT in the European Union: driving productivity divergence?," GGDC Research Memorandum 200363, Groningen Growth and Development Centre, University of Groningen.
    21. Burda, Michael C. & Severgnini, Battista, 2014. "Solow residuals without capital stocks," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 154-171.
    22. Duffy, John & Papageorgiou, Chris, 2000. "A Cross-Country Empirical Investigation of the Aggregate Production Function Specification," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 5(1), pages 87-120, March.
    23. Fried, Harold O. & Lovell, C. A. Knox & Schmidt, Shelton S. (ed.), 1993. "The Measurement of Productive Efficiency: Techniques and Applications," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195072181.
    24. Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Rhodes, E., 1978. "Measuring the efficiency of decision making units," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 2(6), pages 429-444, November.
    25. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for cross-country income differences," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 5266, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    26. Rainer Klump & Peter McAdam & Alpo Willman, 2007. "Factor Substitution and Factor-Augmenting Technical Progress in the United States: A Normalized Supply-Side System Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 89(1), pages 183-192, February.
    27. Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, 1999. "Why do Some Countries Produce So Much More Output Per Worker than Others?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 83-116.
    28. Fare, Rolf & Shawna Grosskopf & Mary Norris & Zhongyang Zhang, 1994. "Productivity Growth, Technical Progress, and Efficiency Change in Industrialized Countries," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(1), pages 66-83, March.
    29. Psacharopoulos, George, 1994. "Returns to investment in education: A global update," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 22(9), pages 1325-1343, September.
    30. Thijs ten Raa & Victoria Shestalova, 2021. "The Solow Residual, Domar Aggregation, and Inefficiency: A Synthesis of TFP Measures," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Efficiency and Input-Output Analyses Theory and Applications, chapter 2, pages 23-38, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    31. Oleg Badunenko & Daniel J. Henderson & Valentin Zelenyuk, 2008. "Technological Change and Transition: Relative Contributions to Worldwide Growth During the 1990s," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 70(4), pages 461-492, August.
    32. Jerzmanowski, Michal, 2007. "Total factor productivity differences: Appropriate technology vs. efficiency," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(8), pages 2080-2110, November.
    33. Joaquin Maudos & Jose Manuel Pastor & Lorenzo Serrano, 2000. "Convergence in OECD countries: technical change, efficiency and productivity," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(6), pages 757-765.
    34. Simar, Leopold & Wilson, Paul W., 2002. "Non-parametric tests of returns to scale," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 115-132, May.
    35. Subodh Kumar & R. Robert Russell, 2002. "Technological Change, Technological Catch-up, and Capital Deepening: Relative Contributions to Growth and Convergence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(3), pages 527-548, June.
    36. Daniel J. Henderson & R. Robert Russell, 2005. "Human Capital And Convergence: A Production-Frontier Approach ," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 46(4), pages 1167-1205, November.
    37. Jakub Growiec, 2012. "The World Technology Frontier: What Can We Learn from the US States?-super-," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 74(6), pages 777-807, December.
    38. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for cross-country income differences," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 3567, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    39. Francesco Caselli & Wilbur John Coleman II, 2006. "The World Technology Frontier," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 96(3), pages 499-522, June.
    40. R. D. Banker & A. Charnes & W. W. Cooper, 1984. "Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(9), pages 1078-1092, September.
    41. Klump, Rainer & McAdam, Peter & Willman, Alpo, 2004. "Factor substitution and factor augmenting technical progress in the US: a normalized supply-side system approach," Working Paper Series 367, European Central Bank.
    42. Peter J. Klenow & Mark Bils, 2000. "Does Schooling Cause Growth?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1160-1183, December.
    43. Johannes Van Biesebroeck, 2007. "Robustness Of Productivity Estimates," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(3), pages 529-569, September.
    44. Gary Koop & Jacek Osiewalski & Mark F. J. Steel, 1999. "The Components of Output Growth: A Stochastic Frontier Analysis," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 61(4), pages 455-487, November.
    45. Pandey, Manish, 2008. "Human capital aggregation and relative wages across countries," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 1587-1601, December.
    46. Bos, J.W.B. & Economidou, C. & Koetter, M. & Kolari, J.W., 2010. "Do all countries grow alike?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 113-127, January.
    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. Jakub Growiec & Anna Pajor & Dorota Gorniak & Artur Predki, 2015. "The shape of aggregate production functions: evidence from estimates of the World Technology Frontier," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 46(4), pages 299-326.
    2. Paul E. Brockway & Harry Saunders & Matthew K. Heun & Timothy J. Foxon & Julia K. Steinberger & John R. Barrett & Steve Sorrell, 2017. "Energy Rebound as a Potential Threat to a Low-Carbon Future: Findings from a New Exergy-Based National-Level Rebound Approach," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-24, January.
    3. Paul E. Brockway & Matthew K. Heun & João Santos & John R. Barrett, 2017. "Energy-Extended CES Aggregate Production: Current Aspects of Their Specification and Econometric Estimation," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-23, February.
    4. Matthew K. Heun & João Santos & Paul E. Brockway & Randall Pruim & Tiago Domingos & Marco Sakai, 2017. "From Theory to Econometrics to Energy Policy: Cautionary Tales for Policymaking Using Aggregate Production Functions," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-44, February.
    5. Enrico Marelli & Marcello Signorelli & Joanna Tyrowicz, 2012. "Crises and Joint Employment–Productivity Dynamics: A Comparative Perspective for European Countries," Comparative Economic Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Association for Comparative Economic Studies, vol. 54(2), pages 361-394, June.

    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. Jakub Growiec & Anna Pajor & Dorota Gorniak & Artur Predki, 2015. "The shape of aggregate production functions: evidence from estimates of the World Technology Frontier," Bank i Kredyt, Narodowy Bank Polski, vol. 46(4), pages 299-326.
    2. Jakub Growiec, 2012. "The World Technology Frontier: What Can We Learn from the US States?-super-," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 74(6), pages 777-807, December.
    3. Danish Ahmed SIDDIQUI & Qazi Masood AHMED, 2019. "Are institutions a crucial determinant of cross country economic efficiency? A two-stage double bootstrap data envelopment analysis," Theoretical and Applied Economics, Asociatia Generala a Economistilor din Romania / Editura Economica, vol. 0(1(618), S), pages 89-114, Spring.
    4. repec:agr:journl:v:1(618):y:2019:i:1(618):p:89-114 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Growiec, Jakub, 2008. "Productivity differences across OECD countries, 1970–2000: the world technology frontier revisited," MPRA Paper 11605, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Growiec, Jakub, 2008. "Productivity differences across OECD countries, 1970–2000: the world technology frontier revisited," MPRA Paper 11605, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Jakub Growiec & Łukasz Marć, 2009. "Produktywność czynników w krajach OECD," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 9, pages 23-47.
    8. Jens J. Krüger, 2017. "Revisiting the world technology frontier: a directional distance function approach," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 67-95, March.
    9. Kerekes, Monika, 2007. "Analyzing patterns of economic growth: a production frontier approach," Discussion Papers 2007/15, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    10. Oleg Badunenko & Daniel Henderson & R. Russell, 2013. "Polarization of the worldwide distribution of productivity," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 40(2), pages 153-171, October.
    11. Jan Trenczek & Konstantin M. Wacker, 2023. "Accounting for cross-country output differences: A sectoral CES perspective," Working Papers 2023.09, International Network for Economic Research - INFER.
    12. repec:agr:journl:v:4(621):y:2019:i:4(621):p:241-264 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Marcelo Soto, 2006. "The Causal Effect of Education on Aggregate Income," Working Papers 0605, International Economics Institute, University of Valencia.
    14. Michael Knoblach & Fabian Stöckl, 2020. "What Determines The Elasticity Of Substitution Between Capital And Labor? A Literature Review," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(4), pages 847-875, September.
    15. Danish Ahmed SIDDIQUI & Qazi Masood AHMED, 2019. "Exploring the role of institutions in cross country Malmquist productivity analysis: A two-stage double bootstrap DEA approach," Theoretical and Applied Economics, Asociatia Generala a Economistilor din Romania / Editura Economica, vol. 0(4(621), W), pages 241-264, Winter.
    16. Antonio Ciccone & Elias Papaioannou, 2009. "Human Capital, the Structure of Production, and Growth," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 91(1), pages 66-82, February.
    17. Nicola Gennaioli & Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2013. "Human Capital and Regional Development," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 128(1), pages 105-164.
    18. Duval, Romain & de la Maisonneuve, Christine, 2010. "Long-run growth scenarios for the world economy," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 64-80, January.
    19. Konstantinos Chatzimichael & Vangelis Tzouvelekas, 2014. "Human capital contributions to explain productivity differences," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 41(3), pages 399-417, June.
    20. Jakub Growiec & Lukasz Marc & Dorota Pelle, 2009. "Decomposing productivity growth in OECD countries: domestic R&D vs. international technology diffusion," IBS Working Papers 1/2009, Instytut Badan Strukturalnych.
    21. Jerzmanowski, Michal, 2007. "Total factor productivity differences: Appropriate technology vs. efficiency," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 51(8), pages 2080-2110, November.
    22. Yan Meng & Christopher F. Parmeter & Valentin Zelenyuk, 2023. "Is newer always better? A reinvestigation of productivity dynamics using updated PWT data," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 59(1), pages 1-13, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    technological progress; world technology frontier; countrylevel data; US state-level data; production function; DEA;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E23 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Production
    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • O14 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Industrialization; Manufacturing and Service Industries; Choice of Technology
    • O33 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes
    • 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:nbp:nbpmis:73. 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: Jakub Growiec (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nbpgvpl.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.