Recent attention has focused on the UK's productivity gap in the retail sector. Figure 1 shows an estimate of labour productivity in retail across countries, using output per hour worked. The UK lies well behind the US, France and Germany. Reynolds at al (2005) contribute to this debate by...

This paper describes the characteristics of manufacturing establishments in Britain over the period 1980 to 1996. Particular attention is paid to differences between plants of different ownership nationality. The findings suggest that establishments that are always foreign-owned have...

This report looks at how corporate income taxes have changed over the past two decades, what incentives they provide for domestic and international investment, and whether changes in the international economy have helped shape these reforms.

Many sectors of the UK economy experienced rapid productivity growth over the 1980's. This coincided with an increase in the flow of inward investment. Studies using macro data have linked these two events. This paper investigates what has happened in one industry at the microeconomic level and...