Plutarchos Sakellaris
- 22 December 2005
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 566Details
- Abstract
- We formulate and estimate a structural model of firm investment behavior that specifies the exact channel through which financial frictions bite. The model also allows for the existence of both convex and non-convex costs to adjusting capital. Essentially, we move beyond simply testing and rejecting a neoclassical model without frictions. Our quantitative estimates show that both real and financial frictions have an important effect on firm investment dynamics.
- JEL Code
- E22 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Capital, Investment, Capacity
- 22 June 2004
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 368Details
- Abstract
- Capital quality improvement is a general phenomenon. Therefore quality correction is needed in price indexes. There is substantial evidence of biases in the official price indexes of capital equipment. We apply to euro area statistics estimates of these biases based on US data thus deriving quality-adjusted price indexes. Adjusted for quality, productive capital stocks of equipment and software grow on average 3 percentage points faster annually - a doubling of their growth rates. Quality-adjusted output grows 0.46 percentage points faster annually - a 20 percent increase. In terms of growth accounting, quality adjustment subtracts 11 percentage points from the share of TFP in aggregate growth and adds them to the share of equipment stock. For the 1990s only the difference is even higher: 14 percentage points. When all is told, embodied technological change accounts for 46 percent of (quality-adjusted) output growth in the euro area over the period 1982 to 2000.
- JEL Code
- O3 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Technological Change, Research and Development, Intellectual Property Rights
O47 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity→Measurement of Economic Growth, Aggregate Productivity, Cross-Country Output Convergence
D24 : Microeconomics→Production and Organizations→Production, Cost, Capital, Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity, Capacity
E22 : Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics→Consumption, Saving, Production, Investment, Labor Markets, and Informal Economy→Capital, Investment, Capacity
- 1 July 2002
- WORKING PAPER SERIES - No. 158Details
- Abstract
- We estimate the rate of embodied technological change directly from plant-level manufacturing data on current output and input choices along with histories on their vintages of equipment investment. Our estimates range between 8 and 17 percent for the typical U.S. manufacturing plant during the years 1972-1996. Any number in this range is substantially larger than is conventionally accepted with some important implications. First, the role of investment-specific technological change as an engine of growth is even larger than previously estimated. Second, existing producer durable price indices do not adequately account for quality change. As a result, measured capital stock growth is biased. Third, if accurate, the Hulten and Wykoff (1981) economic depreciation rates may primarily reflect obsolescence.
- JEL Code
- O3 : Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth→Technological Change, Research and Development, Intellectual Property Rights
D24 : Microeconomics→Production and Organizations→Production, Cost, Capital, Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity, Capacity
L60 : Industrial Organization→Industry Studies: Manufacturing→General