The measurement of government productivity poses a challenge for economists. The lack of a marketed output and the multidimensional nature of objectives for government agencies in particular make the measurement of productivity in government more difficult than in the business sector. This...

The measurement of productivity is a complex task. The OECD has recently released a comprehensive manual or guide to the measurement of industry-level and aggregate productivity. In the fifth article, Paul Schreyer from the OECD and the author of the OECD productivity manual provides an overview...

International productivity comparisons have traditionally focused on productivity growth rates. International productivity level comparisons are much more complex, requiring comparable industry data and estimates of purchasing power at a detailed industry level. The International Comparisons of...

What have we learned about productivity in the past two decades? In this article, Andrew Sharpe from the Centre for the Study of Living Standards reviews a recently published NBER volume entitled New Development in Productivity Analysis, edited by Charles R. Hulten, Edwin R. Dean, and Michael J....

The recession left its mark on global productivity, which fell in 2009. The productivity growth differential between the United States and Europe increased dramatically in 2009. Average long-term growth of labour productivity in advanced economies has stalled since 2000. The gradual improvement...

This article attempts to explain the relatively poor productivity growth in four major EU countries (Germany, France, United Kingdom, and Netherlands) relative to the United States. Our study is carried out from a sectoral perspective, focussing on the financial and business services sectors....

The objective of this article is to evaluate the impact of the oil and gas industry on labour productivity growth in Canada since 2000 through an exploration of the various channels, both direct and indirect, by which the oil and gas sector affects aggregate productivity. The article sheds light...

This article identifies three priorities for future productivity research: intangible assets, a better understanding of the impact of innovation on productivity, and a bridging of the gap between firm-level measures of productivity and industry-level and aggregate measures. It also makes the...

The production function underlying standard estimates of multifactor productivity (MFP)typically restricts the list of explicitly measured inputs to capital, labour and intermediate inputs (energy, materials and services). These inputs are measured in the national accounts, and in most...

Recent empirical studies confirm that the contribution of intangible capital investment to labour productivity growth is comparable to that of tangible capital investment for a wide range of countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, and France. Following...