The paper reports the empirical results of the validation of the Stochastic Production Frontier (SPF) Model to an unbalanced panel comprising a cross-section of 8 manufacturing industries over a time span of 26 years The results provide insights on the repercussions of the micro-economic reform...

This paper studies the role of efficiency in a firm's decision to contract out. Emphasis is on the heterogeneous nature of firms and when firms are only considering outsourcing to domestic suppliers. Firm-level data on Australian manufacturing reveal an ordering of efficiency between firms that...

This paper examines the impact of the provision of public transport infrastructure on the cost structure of the Australian economy within a context that recognises industry agglomeration externalities. The paper extends the symmetric generalised quadratic cost function by incorporating public...

In this paper, we investigate productivity growth in 55 major Australian urban water utilities using nonparametric frontier techniques over the period 2005/06 to 2008/09. The five outputs included in the analysis are chemical and microbiological compliance, and the inverses of real loses per...

This paper presents the main findings from a small qualitative survey of the main factors associated with the creation and usage of five industrial capabilities in leading Victorian sectors. The capabilities included advanced manufacturing technologies (AMT), design, information and...

Labour economists have been increasingly interested in the impact of technological change upon employment and unemployment. However, the predominant focus of empirical studies has been on employment and unemployment stocks, whereas technological change is more likely to affect the flows of...

In this paper we consider why firms sometimes choose an external development path for their own inventions, despite the costs of contracting and the risks of opportunistic behaviour and expropriation. We model the probability that firms adopt an external development strategy using survey data...