The authors investigate efficiency and productivity growth of the U.S. banking industry over the latter part of the 1980s and first part of the 1990s using comprehensive data on U.S. commercial banks. Cost efficiency decreased slightly between the 1980s and 1990s, and large banks showed a...

The authors investigate the sources of recent changes in the performance of U.S. banks using concepts and techniques borrowed from the cross-section efficiency literature. Their most striking result is that during 1991-1997, cost productivity worsened while profit productivity improved...

The authors investigate the effects of technological change, deregulation, and dynamic changes in competition on the performance of U.S. banks. The authors' most striking result is that during 1991-1997, cost productivity worsened while profit productivity improved substantially, particularly...

Over the past several years, substantial research effort has gone into measuring the efficiency of financial institutions. Many studies have found that inefficiencies are quite large, on the order of 20 percent or more of total banking industry costs and about half of the industry's potential...