Over the past decades Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) has emerged as an important nonparametric method of evaluating performance of decision making units through benchmarking. Although developed primarily for measuring technical efficiency, DEA is now applied extensively for measuring scale...

In this paper we offer a simple exposition of the neoclassical production theoretic foundations of Data Envelopment Analysis. The concepts of technical efficiency (both input- and output-oriented), scale efficiency, and cost efficiency are explained and the corresponding DEA models are described...