TY  - JOUR
AU  - Basu,Susanto
AU  - Fernald,John G.
AU  - Shapiro,Matthew D.
TI  - Productivity Growth in the 1990s: Technology, Utilization, or Adjustment?
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 8359
PY  - 2001
Y2  - July 2001
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8359
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8359.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Susanto Basu
Department of Economics
Boston College
140 Commonwealth Avenue
Chestnut Hill, MA 02467
Tel: 617/552-2182
Fax: 617/552-2308
E-Mail: susanto.basu@bc.edu

John Fernald
Research Department, Mail Stop 1130
Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
101 Market St
San Francisco, CA 94105
Tel: 415-974-2135
Fax: 815-642-0515
E-Mail: john.fernald@sf.frb.org

Matthew D. Shapiro
Department of Economics
University of Michigan
611 Tappan St
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1220
Tel: 734/764-5419
Fax: 734 764-2769
E-Mail: shapiro@umich.edu
M2  - featured in NBER digest on 2001-10-01
AB  - Measured productivity growth increased substantially during the second half of the 1990s. This paper examines whether this increase owes to an increase in the rate of technological change or whether it can be explained by non-technological factors relating to factor utilization, factor accumulation, or returns to scale. It finds that the recent increase in productivity growth does appear to arise from an increase in technological change. Cyclical utilization raised measured productivity growth relative to technology growth in the first part of the expansion, but lowered it subsequently. Factor adjustment leads to a steady-state understatement of technology growth by measured productivity growth. The understatement was greater in the second half of the expansion than the first. Changes in the distribution of inputs across industries with different returns to scale lead to a modest understatement in the growth in technology. Although the increase technological change is most pronounced in durable manufacturing, technological change also increased outside of manufacturing.
ER  -