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Labour Productivity (labour + productivity)
Selected AbstractsCOLONIALISM AND INDUSTRIALISATION: FACTORY LABOUR PRODUCTIVITY OF COLONIAL KOREA, 1913,37AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, Issue 1 2008Duol Kim colonial Korea; colonialism; entrepreneurship; factory labour productivity; industrialisation Unlike other colonial economies, Korea industrialised rapidly during its colonial period, which past scholars attributed to the industrialisation policy directed by the Japanese colonial government between 1930 and 1945. Our analysis of factory labour productivity from 1913 to 1937 suggests significant revisions to this claim. Factory labour productivity as well as total production grew rapidly before the active intervention of the colonial government. In addition, Korean entrepreneurs invested heavily in their firms and successfully competed with Japanese entrepreneurs. We conjecture that the pre-war experience of Korean entrepreneurs provided a critical foundation for the post-colonial economic growth. [source] Catching-up of East German Labour Productivity in the 1990sGERMAN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 3 2000Ray Barrell We provide empirical evidence for exogenous and endogenous catching-up of East German labour productivity to West German levels. We argue that labour productivity in East Germany has caught up faster than has happened elsewhere. The sudden formation of the German Monetary Union was followed by large transfers to East Germany, migration of workers to West Germany, reorganization and privatization of East German firms. This has quickly led to a partial closing of the organizational, idea and object gaps that existed between East and West Germany. This paper analyses labour productivity in East and West Germany using both aggregate German data and unbalanced panel analysis of developments in East and West Germany. Factors affecting the organization of production, and especially privatization and ,foreign' firms, are found to be particularly important in this context. [source] THE SOURCES OF AGGREGATE PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH: US MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES, 1958,1996BULLETIN OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH, Issue 4 2008Jens J. Krüger L16; O12; O33; L60 ABSTRACT The sources of aggregate productivity growth are explored using detailed data for four-digit US manufacturing industries during 1958,96 and a decomposition formula that allows us to quantify the contribution of structural change. Labour productivity as well as total factor productivity are considered with either value-added or employment shares serving as aggregation weights. It is shown that structural change generally works in favour of industries with increasing productivity. This effect is particularly strong in the years since 1990, in high-tech industries and in durable goods producing industries. The impact of the computer revolution can be clearly identified. [source] Labour market adjustment a hundred years ago: the case of the Catalan textile industry, 1880,19131ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, Issue 1 2008JORDI DOMENECH This paper studies the way workers and firms behaved in a highly cyclical sector such as the Catalan cotton textile industry. Using firm level evidence from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the paper shows that, in spite of weak unionization and the lack of regional or local collective bargaining institutions, piece rates in cotton spinning and weaving were not subject to competitive rate cuts and remained fixed over the cycle. When facing a negative demand shock, firms adjusted by reducing output, hours of work, labour productivity, and employment. The paper finally evaluates the possible sources of wage rigidity in the industry. [source] Performance and Policy of Foundation-owned Firms in GermanyEUROPEAN FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT, Issue 3 2002Markus Herrmann This paper compares performance and policy of foundation-owned firms and of listed corporations in Germany. Foundations have no owners so that there exist no individuals with financial ownership claims on firms which are wholly owned by foundations. This suggests weaker outside control of foundation-owned firms implying lower profitability. The empirical findings show a slightly better performance of foundation-owned firms compared to corporations. Foundation-owned firms display higher labour intensity, lower labour productivity, and lower salary levels. This policy promotes job security without endangering the viability of foundation-owned firms. [source] Catching-up of East German Labour Productivity in the 1990sGERMAN ECONOMIC REVIEW, Issue 3 2000Ray Barrell We provide empirical evidence for exogenous and endogenous catching-up of East German labour productivity to West German levels. We argue that labour productivity in East Germany has caught up faster than has happened elsewhere. The sudden formation of the German Monetary Union was followed by large transfers to East Germany, migration of workers to West Germany, reorganization and privatization of East German firms. This has quickly led to a partial closing of the organizational, idea and object gaps that existed between East and West Germany. This paper analyses labour productivity in East and West Germany using both aggregate German data and unbalanced panel analysis of developments in East and West Germany. Factors affecting the organization of production, and especially privatization and ,foreign' firms, are found to be particularly important in this context. [source] Worker voice, managerial response and labour productivity: an empirical investigationINDUSTRIAL RELATIONS JOURNAL, Issue 5 2006Alex Bryson ABSTRACT This article investigates the relationship between worker voice practices, employee perceptions of managerial responsiveness and labour productivity. It argues that managerial responsiveness is a critical but under-investigated variable in the study of the relationship between worker voice, human resource management and performance. Our results suggest that managerial responsiveness to worker voice does lead to superior labour productivity. However, this relationship is only found in non-union workplaces and there is little relationship between formal voice regime and productivity. One important implication of this finding is that more responsive management will result in improved productivity, so policy interventions should focus on how to motivate managers to become more responsive to their employees. [source] Changing medical doctor productivity and its affecting factors in rural ChinaINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HEALTH PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT, Issue 2 2004Tim Martineau Abstract Using the data collected from the health facility-based survey, part of the national health service survey conducted in 1993 and 1998, this paper tries to examine changes in labour productivity among the county-level hospitals and township health centres in rural China, and to analyse factors affecting the changes. The results presented in the paper show that the average number of outpatient visits per doctor per day and the average number of inpatient days per doctor per day declined significantly over the period from 1986 to 1997. The main factors resulting in the reduction of productivity are associated with the increase of inappropriate staff recruitment in these health facilities, the significant decline of rural population covered by health insurance, particularly rural cooperative medical schemes (CMS), and the rapid rise of health care costs. The latter two factors also have brought about a reduction in the use of these health facilities by the rural population. The paper suggests that the government should tighten up the entrance of health and non-health staff into the rural health sector and develop effective measures aimed to avoid providing pervasive financial incentives to the over-provision of services and over-use of drugs. In addition, other measures that help to increase the demand for health services, such as the establishment of rural health insurance, should be considered seriously. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Impact of international tourism on the Chinese economyINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF TOURISM RESEARCH, Issue 5 2006Jan Oosterhaven Abstract Since 1990, international tourism to China has grown dramatically, as has the rest of the Chinese economy. Its impact on the Chinese economy is estimated for 1997, the last year for which sufficient input,output, social accounting and tourist expenditure data are available when the paper was written. With these data, a so-called type II input,output model is constructed, which enables to estimate direct, indirect and induced impacts. The results show that 1.64% of gross domestic product, 1.40% of household income and 1.01% of Chinese employment is dependent on international tourism. The differences are explained by the sectoral composition of the tourist expenditures, together with the sectoral differences in capital/labour ratios, labour productivity and backward linkages. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Economic Liberalization and Smallholder Productivity in Tanzania.JOURNAL OF AGRARIAN CHANGE, Issue 3 2005From Promised Success to Real Failure In the mid-1980s, Tanzania adopted a programme for economic liberalization of the entire economy, including agriculture. After pressure from the IMF and the World Bank in particular, but also from most of the bilateral donors, agricultural producer and input prices were decontrolled, panterritorial prices were abolished, subsidies were removed and trade in agricultural products and inputs was to a large extent taken over by private traders. The international donor community promised that economic liberalization would provide a strong stimulus to Tanzanian agriculture, resulting in increasing yields, increased labour productivity, rising agricultural production and higher incomes. However, available data show that, as far as food crop production is concerned, this promise has not been fulfilled. Even compared to the ,crisis years' 1979,1984, labour productivity, yields and production per capita of food grains stagnated or declined up to the end of the 1990s. Some causes of this failure are discussed. [source] The ,reversal of fortune' thesis and the compression of history: Perspectives from African and comparative economic history,JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 8 2008Gareth Austin Abstract Acemoglu, Johnson and Robinson have dramatically challenged the tendency of economists to confine their empirical search for the causes of economic growth to the recent past. They argue that the kind of institutions established by European colonialists, either protecting private property or extracting rents, resulted in the poorer parts of the pre-colonial world becoming some of the richest economies of today; while transforming some of the more prosperous parts of the non-European world of 1500 into the poorest economies today. This view has been further elaborated for Africa by Nunn, with reference to slave trading. Drawing on African and comparative economic historiography, the present paper endorses the importance of examining growth theories against long-term history: revealing relationships that recur because the situations are similar, as well as because of path dependence as such. But it also argues that the causal relationships involved are more differentiated than is recognised in AJR's formulations. By compressing different historical periods and paths, the ,reversal' thesis over-simplifies the causation. Relatively low labour productivity was a premise of the external slave trades; though the latter greatly reinforced the relative poverty of many Sub-Saharan economies. Again, it is important to distinguish settler and non-settler economies within colonial Africa itself. In the latter case it was in the interests of colonial regimes to support, rather than simply extract from, African economic enterprise. Finally, economic rent and economic growth have often been joint products, including in pre-colonial and colonial Africa; the kinds of institutions that favoured economic growth in certain historical contexts were not necessarily optimal for that purpose in others. AJR have done much to bring development economics and economic history together. The next step is a more flexible conceptual framework, and a more complex explanation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Migration and welfare: a very simple modelJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 7 2007Roberto Cellini Abstract The paper presents a very simple model of migration, relying on three widely accepted points: first, labour productivity and wages in a country depend on the present average human capital; second, agents maximise their utility, so that migration decisions depend on the wage gap across economies; third, the larger the personal human capital, the higher the propensity is to migrate (ceteris paribus). The model shows that migration through its external effects always lowers the welfare in the sending country, while the effects on the receiving country can be positive or negative. As a consequence, selfish developed economies could desire a larger migration than the optimal level for a benevolent World Planner. This calls for international coordination concerning the regulation of migration flows. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Skills under threat: the case of HIV/AIDS in the mining industry in ZimbabweJOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, Issue 5 2006Caroline N. Matangi Abstract The Zimbabwe mining industry is currently battling to arrest further spread of the HIV/AIDS crisis in workplaces, especially its impact on labour productivity. Labour in the closed community of mines has been greatly susceptible to HIV/AIDS infection. The current AIDS incidence in the mine sites is estimated at a weighted average of 15,per,cent amongst miners, with the largest category of workers,the 30,39 years age group,also constituting the worst affected category. Given the current state of the country's economy and consequently its adverse impact on the lifestyle of miners, the pandemic is expected to increase. This paper builds on the work of the ILO (1995) involving a survey of 18 various firms/institutions. The survey was carried out in Zambia in order to assess the impact of HIV/AIDS on the productive labour force. The survey revealed that many of the firms are experiencing irregular work attendance, ,wasted' training as some of the trained workers are constantly ill or die, high medical bills, funeral costs and reduced productivity and profits. An analysis of data on the main causes of death in 1993 shows that at least 61.8,per,cent of deaths could be attributed to causes that are very closely related to HIV/AIDS complications. Based on points highlighted by respondents and analysis of symptoms suffered, it was observed that HIV/AIDS tended to affect most general workers (36.8,per,cent), followed by the lower management (30.9,per,cent) and the middle management (20.6,per,cent). Comparatively, 11.8,per,cent of the deaths in 1993 belonged to the top management. Although it is hard to appreciate the meaning of the figures without knowledge of the number of people in each category, it nevertheless helps to form a clear picture of the impact of HIV/AIDS on industry. This paper seeks to further investigate the impact of HIV/AIDS on the productive labour force, by focusing on one particular industry,mining,using a blend of research methods to collect the data. This paper examines the impact of HIV/AIDS on the productive labour force and management responses. It forms part of the findings of data gathered in 2001 in the mining industry in Zimbabwe, to examine factors affecting management responses to HIV/AIDS in the mine sites. Zimbabwe is a country with a complex historical legacy of mine labour. This phenomenon can largely be attributed to the production oriented nature of the mining industry. Mines focus mainly on mineral extraction and as a result the bulk of mine workers tend to be production workers whose skills have developed over long periods of time. Production workers on mines have a tradition of long-term employment. This phenomenon has meant that labour in the mines is hard to replace as a result of skills, especially tacit knowledge, acquired over many years. Thus while the recent closure of some gold mines, largely due to low commodity prices, has meant that more miners are available in the labour market, this situation has not necessarily eased the process of replacing labour lost to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, as certain skills are firm specific. Production workers are predominantly male with the bulk falling in the 35,39 years age group. Most mine workers reside in mine villages, a colonial legacy that ensured miners were close to the workplace. The village system is a system of housing labourers, which demonstrates capitalistic methods of controlling labour and minimising costs. Of significance in this study's background is how the village system has come to be viewed as a factor in the spread of HIV/AIDS in the mining communities, because of its ,closed' nature. It is against this complex historical backdrop that the paper turns to examine the impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic on production workers and management responses to the crisis using the Resource Based View of the Firm model (RBV), one of the theories in the Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) tradition. RBV was chosen for this study out of many HRM models that exist, because this theory, in particular, explains why it is advantageous for sites to use their ,unique' firm based resources in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Given this rationale it was, therefore, presumed that this theory would best apply in mines battling with the adverse impact of HIV/AIDS on productivity, especially in the light of the harsh national economic climate, which would likely place limitations on response mechanisms. Further, the issue of firm-specific skills was also taken into consideration as an important factor in the mines, limiting their ability to resort to external solutions. Thus, given these factors, RBV was deemed the most appropriate model. The study finds that the pandemic depresses labour productivity through a number of significant ways: increased rate of HIV/AIDS induced absenteeism gradual labour turnover as a result of AIDS induced morbidity; and consequently declining skills availability, particularly firm-specific skills. Maintaining labour productivity in the face of gradually diminishing skills and indisposed labour will be key to softening the adverse economic consequences of the pandemic in the mines. To reduce the threat to labour productivity, mines must find ways of utilising, to the maximum extent practicable, existing skills. Results indicate that a move towards the utilisation of existing miners is the most favoured response mechanism in most mines. Utilising existing miners enables mines from spending financial resources on avoidable recruitment and training and quite often mechanisation, which may not necessarily be compatible with the old infrastructure in certain mines. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] COLONIALISM AND INDUSTRIALISATION: FACTORY LABOUR PRODUCTIVITY OF COLONIAL KOREA, 1913,37AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, Issue 1 2008Duol Kim colonial Korea; colonialism; entrepreneurship; factory labour productivity; industrialisation Unlike other colonial economies, Korea industrialised rapidly during its colonial period, which past scholars attributed to the industrialisation policy directed by the Japanese colonial government between 1930 and 1945. Our analysis of factory labour productivity from 1913 to 1937 suggests significant revisions to this claim. Factory labour productivity as well as total production grew rapidly before the active intervention of the colonial government. In addition, Korean entrepreneurs invested heavily in their firms and successfully competed with Japanese entrepreneurs. We conjecture that the pre-war experience of Korean entrepreneurs provided a critical foundation for the post-colonial economic growth. [source] R&D INVESTMENTS AND SEQUENTIAL WAGE NEGOTIATIONS,AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC PAPERS, Issue 3 2009JUAN CARLOS BÁRCENA-RUIZ This paper analyses how the structure of wage bargaining affects R&D investment by firms that increases the productivity of labour in a Cournot duopoly. We find that total expenditure on R&D is greater when wages are set simultaneously than when they are set sequentially. Thus sequential wage negotiations reduce the incentive for firms to innovate and affect the productivity of labour. When wage negotiations are sequential the productivity of labour is greater (lower) in the follower (leader) firm than when negotiations are simultaneous. We also obtain that for same parameter values it is possible for the firm with the lower productivity to end up paying a higher wage than the firm with the higher level of labour productivity. [source] REGIONAL UNEMPLOYMENT DISPARITIES: AN EVALUATION OF POLICY MEASURES,AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC PAPERS, Issue 4 2008N. GROENEWOLD This paper analyses the efficacy of regional and federal government policies in reducing inter-regional unemployment disparities. We use as our framework a two-region general equilibrium model with a given freely-mobile supply of labour. We assume inter-regional migration to occur in response to inter-regional utility differentials. Each region has households, firms and a regional government. In addition to regional governments, there is a federal government. The firms in a region use a single factor, labour, to produce a single good which we assume to be different to that produced in the other region. It is supplied to households and to the regional government in the form of payroll taxes. Households consume some, trade some with households in the other region and give some up to the federal government as income tax. Firms and households bargain over wages and firms then choose employment to maximise profits. The resulting equilibrium will generally not be a full-employment one. We simulate a linearised numerical version of the model. We examine seven alternative policies, six carried out by a regional government and one by the federal government. In the first group there are traditional tax/expenditure polices as well as policies which might be seen as attacking the natural rate of unemployment: changes in unemployment benefits, changes in union power, changes in the labour force and changes in labour productivity. The federal government policy is a regionally-differentiated fiscal policy. Contrary to expectations, many policies which have traditionally been recommended to alleviate unemployment are found, in fact, to exacerbate the unemployment problem. [source] Internal Wage Structures and Organizational PerformanceBRITISH JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, Issue 1 2003P. B. Beaumont This paper considers whether a hierarchical or compressed wage structure is positively associated with relatively high levels of organizational performance. To date, there has been little empirical research in this area (especially in the UK). Thus we present an operational measure of a compressed/hierarchical wage structure, using UK manufacturing micro,data in five industrial sectors, and examine its relationship with labour productivity. We find that the wage compression argument holds in one sector but not for the majority of sectors and that taking into account other, intra,industry characteristics, namely size and ownership differences, further weakens the relationship. [source] The Economics of Teams among TechniciansBRITISH JOURNAL OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, Issue 1 2001Rosemary Batt This paper examines the economic logic of organizing field technicians into self-managed teams, an approach to work organization that shifts the division of labour from a hierarchical to horizontal one. Economic efficiencies arise through the integration of direct and indirect labour tasks and the alignment of'the organizational structure with the occupational logic of communities of practice among technicians. Self-managed teams absorb the monitoring and co-ordination tasks of supervisors, substantially reducing indirect labour costs but without adversely affecting objective measures of quality and labour productivity. For technicians, team membership means longer work hours, but higher wages through overtime pay. [source] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||