The Productivity Commission released a Staff Working Paper ‘Can Australia Match US Productivity Performance?’ (by Ben Dolman, Dean Parham and Simon Zheng) in March 2007. The paper considers whether it is feasible for Australia to match the US level of productivity. While other countries have...

Market sector productivity — the output produced per hour worked — grew at an annual rate of 3.2 per cent during the five years to 1998-99, which was the fastest rate on record. In the five years to 2003-04, productivity growth eased to 2.2 per cent per year, which is around the average rate...

"Australia's productivity has grown 1 percentage point per year slower in the current decade than in the 1990s. This article shows that almost one-half of the slowdown is related to unusual developments in the mining industry, the effects of drought and the overstatement of productivity growth...

Previous studies have shown that countries trade and invest more with partner countries from which they have received more migrants, presumably because migrant networks provide information on financial opportunities abroad. This literature focusing on migrants within individual countries is...

This Productivity Commission staff working paper (by Geoff Gilfillan and Les Andrews) was released in January 2011. The contribution of mature aged women (aged 45 to 64 years) to total hours worked in the economy by people of working age has increased from 6 to 15 per cent over the past three...

This staff working paper (by Paula Barnes) examines multifactor productivity growth cycles at the industry level in Australia. There is considerable variation in industry-specific cycles across industries and the market sector. Moreover, the cycles chosen to examine industry MFP growth can have...

The Productivity Commission inquiry report, released 8 August 2011, recommends a major overhaul of Australia’s aged care system to improve the wellbeing of older Australians and meet the challenges of an ageing population.<p> Over one million older Australians receive aged care services. The...</p>

The Productivity Commission inquiry report — Disability Care and Support — was released on 10 August 2011. Current disability support arrangements are inequitable, underfunded, fragmented, and inefficient and give people with a disability little choice. They provide no certainty that people...

The Productivity Commission’s inquiry report — Australia’s Urban Water Sector — was released in October 2011. In recent times, the urban water sector has faced drought, growing populations and ageing assets. Governments have largely responded with prolonged and severe water restrictions...

Through the Rural Research and Development Corporations (RDCs), rural industries and the Australian Government together invest some $490 million a year in R&D. This co-investment model has important strengths, including: helping to ensure that public money is not spent on research of little...