productivity growth of newly industrializing economies in heterogeneous capital goods markets the case of the korean machinery and equipment industry although many previous studies have investigated the economic growth of east asian countries from the perspective of productivity growth they have adopted a limited focus only on the national level or on the aggregated level and have overlooked the heterogeneity at the disaggregated level furthermore only a few studies have examined the sources of the remarkable growth and trade performance of the korean machinery and equipment industry despite its importance for sustainable growth of national economy therefore we investigated the total factor productivity growth tfpg of the korean machinery and equipment industry and its 12 sub sectors from 1970 to 2012 using the stochastic frontier production approach as a result we found that the industry has achieved labour input driven tfpg largely due to technical progress this is contrary to the previous result that east asia has expanded the production frontier by capital accumulation in contrast in some sub sectors scale effect and allocation effici

imports of technology and the technological effort of indian enterprises abstract an important policy oriented question currently asked in some of the newly industrializing countries is whether their enterprises imports of technology discourage or enhance their own technological effort and whether the private benefits of the imported technologies differ from the social benefits this paper examines the question with reference to the experience of indian enterprises using multiple regression analysis it was found that these enterprises technological efforts are favorably affected in cases where the imports are intended to complement their technological effort rather than merely to produce new products but are discouraged if those enterprises have obtained an exclusive right of sale in the home market increases in the number of collaboration agreements and in enterprise size induce only an equiproportionate increase in the level of technological effort the evidence from the empirical analyses is then used to argue that the social benefits of the imported technologies are likely to be less than the private benefits

building technological capability for industrialization analytical frameworks and korea s experience this paper first presents five analytical frameworks technology trajectory absorptive capacity technology transfer crisis construction and dynamic learning process that may be used to examine the process of technological learning at the firm level these frameworks are interrelated to develop an integrative model the korean experience is then discussed as a case in point to illustrate how the frameworks can be used to analyze the process of building technological capability for industrialization the paper also discusses many implications for public policy and corporate management in other countries copyright 1999 by oxford university press

technical change in latin american manufacturing firms review and synthesis abstract this paper reviews the accumulated evidence from a number of firm level case studies of technical change in latin american manufacturing industries carried out during the late 1970s and 1980s these studies it is argued have considerably advanced our understanding of the nature determinants and impact of incremental technical change in industrial enterprises but while the studies are of considerable importance to discussions of infant industry protection and dynamic comparative advantage their restricted scope does not allow us to arrive at any hard and fast policy conclusions the paper closes with a consideration of some possible research issues for the 1990s emphasizing how firm level technical change may be affected by changing macroeconomic conditions and the advent of new microelectronics based technologies

local pay determination theoretical models of local pay are reviewed ranging from neoclassical perspectives unemployment wage trade off models and segmented labor market approaches the empirical work on u s north south differentials is discussed for the u k studies of the extent of and trends in geographical pay differentials are considered as well as behavioral explanations focusing on the role of excess demand the issue of adjustment processes is then discussed both in theory and in relation to empirical work for the u s and u k this discussion focuses largely on geographical spillover effects in terms of origins evidence and issues of identification finally the impact of certain impediments in the adjustment process are considered specifically in relation to the u k these concern the role and influence of national wage bargaining as well as factors inhibiting labor migration stemming from the housing market and the climate of the national labor market copyright 1992 by blackwell publishers ltd

age effects leverage and firm growth abstract recent theories of firm dynamics emphasize the role of financial variables as determinants of firm growth empirically examining these relationships has been difficult since there is a lack of financial data on the small young and private firms using a unique administrative data set this paper considers the growth of new firms in canadian manufacturing from a financial perspective we find that financial factors such as leverage and initial financial size impact growth rates for new firms further the inclusion of leverage has little impact on the economic significance of the conditional age and size relationships with firm growth

the accumulation of technology capital goods production in developing countries revisited abstract this paper examines theoretical and empirical issues related to the establishment of new capital goods industries in developing countries conventional theoretical approaches emphasize economic growth through allocation of substantial resources to capital goods production an extension of these approaches is proposed to account for the increasingly important role of the sector in innovation and diffusion of technology in addition it is argued that the global diffusion of key value added core components and the imperatives of dynamic information related economies of scale tend to erode comparative advantages from low labor costs in developing countries

technological capabilities and industrialization abstract this paper reviews the implications for industrial strategy of recent research on technological capabilities at the firm and national levels after exploring the nature and determinants of microlevel technological development a simple framework for explaining the growth of national capabilities is set out based on the interplay of incentives capabilities and institutions each may suffer market failure and so require corrective intervention the experience of some industrializing countries is described to assess the validity of this framework it is concluded that interventions carefully and selectively applied are necessary for industrial success

causes of multiproduct production the case of the engineering industries in developing countries abstract concepts developed in recent literature on multiproduct industries are used to explain the absence of vertical and horizontal specialization in the capital goods industries in developing countries diversification of product mix generally occurs as firms seek to capture positive economies of scope due to idle machine capacity it is argued here that in doing so they fail to take account of organizational diseconomies of scope which result from such diversification with growth in market size greater specialization might be expected as economies of scope due to idle machine capacity are eliminated if however domestic prices for the products a firm produces are higher than world prices for those products there will be a continued incentive for diversification rather than specialization

on intertemporal substitution and aggregate labor supply in this paper the author presents an econometric investigation of t he implications of the intertemporal substitution hypothesis for aggregate employment in the united states the tests are based on a version of the hypothesis with time separable preferences on the basis of the evidence produced the hypothesis is quite successful in explaining fluctuations in aggregate employment although almost totally unsuccessful in accounting for fluctuations in employee hours these findings suggest that the hypothesis might have an important role to play in macroeconomic modeling although they contradict attempts to account for aggregate fluctuations solely in terms of continuous competitive equilibrium in labor markets copyright 1987 by university of chicago press

technology transfer to developing countries through engineering firms the canadian experience abstract this article presents the results of an empirical study conducted on some 50 major international projects conducted by the 36 largest canadian consulting engineering firms in developing countries the study concludes that contrary to the neoclassical assumption of cost free information adoption technology transfer costs are positive and mostly concentrated in the area of training it also finds that successful transfers involves a specific set of capabilities and are usually conducted through joint ventures between the transferor and the transferee that successful transferees often conduct research and development do not suffer from host government restrictions and are not usually located in africa

industrialisation strategies in less developed countries some lessons of historical experience most of the history of industrialisation in the less developed countries ldcs of the capitalist world has been examined under two headings import substituting industrialisation isi and export orientated industrialisation eoi some of the most influential authors and policy advisers have been moving rapidly to a position of treating these experiences as closed chapters of development economics the verdict is that isi has not worked or only in its early stages and that eoi under liberal policies has been so successful that ldcs in general should follow this route our argument is that isi has indeed led to substantial static inefficiency and foreign exchange problems but that from a dynamic perspective the analyses are still most unsatisfactory for both conceptual and empirical reasons second we suggest that the alleged superiority of eoi is not so much due to the adoption of more rational market orientated policies but due to a combination of cyclical and historical factors and to subst

aggregate implications of factor substitution in industrial processes abstract using a number of recently completed studies of the scope for factor substitution in industrial processes we estimate the total private benefits of systematic adoption cost minimizing technology as compared with capital intensive technology obstacles to the choice of such technology are examined and presented within a benefit cost framework the reasons for some of the current choices of technology are analyzed and policies necessary to alter these are suggested

technology imports and r d efforts of korean manufacturing firms abstract this paper analyzes the relationship between technology imports and r d efforts of korean manufacturing firms by a two stage method in the first stage using a sample representing the whole population of firms the paper shows that firms importing technology tend to commit themselves to r d efforts through having formal r d institutes in the second stage it shows that among firms with formal r d institutes technology imports have non complementary relationship with r d efforts moreover when technology imports are considered interactively with international inventive activity they turn out to have rather a substitutive relationship with r d efforts

generalising gibrat using chinese evidence founded on fieldwork this paper reports on determinants of small firm growth and survival using fieldwork evidence collected by face to face and telephone interviews it extends the basic size age model to a comprehensive growth model with two types of additional explanatory variables firm specific and business environmental estimation is by log linear regression on chinese cross section data with corrections for sample selection bias and heteroskedasticity our results from the comprehensive model highlight the importance of location choice and customer orientation for the growth of chinese private firms

agglomeration advantages and capability building in industrial clusters the missing link accumulation of technological capability is crucial for industrial growth and competitiveness of firms particularly in the context of liberalisation and increasing international economic integration the article sheds new light on the forces driving capability building by complementing the micro economic perspective on learning with a meso economic perspective that takes account of interaction effects arising from firms embeddedness in regional networks the missing link at the interface between the two levels is explored by means of a taxonomy linking various agglomeration advantages to investments in technological effort the framework results in new policy relevant insights about the factors underpinning the acquisition of capabilities in comparison to conventional studies a case study about farm equipment manufacturing in pakistan s punjab province is used as an empirical illustration

technological effort and disembodied technology exports an econometric analysis of inter industry variations in india abstract this paper attempts a preliminary test of the determinants of indian technological capability as measured by disembodied technology exports by a sample of the largest private sector quoted companies in india after placing the study in the context of research on the nature of technological activity in developing countries the authors describe the variables which they have used to explain inter industry variation in technology exports the results of a preliminary statistical investigation are presented despite acknowledged limitations of data the authors are able to suggest some interesting tendencies which could be the subject of further investigation a formal rd b skill and scale requirements appear to promote technological development rather than retard it c the presence of foreign ownership does not seem to inhibit technological development or technology exports

technology imports and their impacts on the enhancement of china s indigenous technological capability this article analyses the pattern of technology imports and its influences on china s indigenous technology indigenous technology consists of two dimensions technology generation measured by rd and application measured by output value of heavy industry and its export value respectively the analysis reveals increased reliance on foreign loans to finance technology imports diversified sources of supply and strong emphasis on the purchase of disembodied technology after the late 1970s based on time series data from 1960 to 1991 statistical evidence indicates that imported technology has significantly enhanced china s technological build up imported technology is positively correlated with both dimensions

how effective are capital controls a number of authors have recently argued that in order to avoid financial instability emerging countries should rely on capital controls two type of controls have been considered controls on capital outflows and controls on capital inflows in this paper i review the historical evidence on the effectiveness of these two type of controls i argue that controls on outflows have been ineffective they are circumvented and breed corruption i also analyze chile s recent experience with controls on inflows and i argue that their effectiveness has been exaggerated

structural adjustment policies and productive efficiency of socialist enterprises abstract the paper uses panel data from a five percent stratified random sample of yugoslav industrial enterprises to test several hypotheses about the determinants of productive efficiency the estimating procedure selects the production function best supported by the data and allows for industry specific production function parameters as well as from firm specific fixed or random effects the instrumental variable estimates suggest that productive efficiency is unaffected by the four structural policy variables whose effect we examine the extent of export orientation joint venture status divisionalization of the firm and the firm s market share

payments for imported technologies market rivalry and adaptive activity in the newly industrialising countries some enterprises in the newly industrialising countries have recently begun to develop their technological capabilities by first learning to adapt imported technologies this article examines two questions raised by this import and adapt strategy first is the level of the adaptive activity of an individual enterprise influenced by its payments for the imported technologies second in situations where the importer faces market rivals does the answer to the first question also apply for the industry as a whole the analyses of these questions point to some useful policy implications

technology diffusion and international income convergence abstract a macroeconomic model of international income convergence driven by differences in technology is presented ldc firms adopt foreign technology by paying an upfront cost of adaptation and early adopters create a positive externality for followers in equilibrium adoption is gradual and so is income convergence because of the externality small differences in adoption costs across ldcs can lead to large differences in long run income during convergence the ldc economy is dualistic with large high technology firms operating alongside small traditional establishments the effects of trade policy and direct foreign investment are also examined

the relationship between firm growth size and age estimates for 100 manufacturing industries this study uses a sample of all firms operating in 100 manufacturing industries to examine some aspects of firm dynamics it finds that firm growth the variability of firm growth and the probability that a firm will fail decrease with firm age it also finds that firm growth decreases at a diminishing rate with firm size even after controlling for the exit of slow growing firms from the sample gibrat s law therefore fails although the severity of the failure decreases with firm size copyright 1987 by blackwell publishing ltd

a reapraisal of the capital goods sector in hong kong the case for free trade abstract this paper was provoked by an earlier one by fransman 1982 in which he examined the functioning of the capital goods sector in hong kong and came to the conclusion that it needed special protection by the government to allow it to reap the benefits of externalities essential for increasing its design and production capabilities statistical evidence is provided indicating that the capital goods sector as conventionally defined is prospering even following fransman 1982 and equating the capital goods sector with the machine producing sector the latest survey of production indicates considerable dynamism his case for infant industry protection is further weakened by consideration of the nature of the particular industrial structure of hong kong and the quality of the social relations that prevail between entrepreneurs it is argued that the costs of singling out the capital goods sector for special treatment in terms of the impact of the highly competitive export oriented manufacturing sector are likely to be high while the theoretical benefits from externalities are liable to be illusory in a small economy

age size growth and survival uk companies in the 1980s this paper examines growth and survival amongst quoted and unquoted u k companies in the period 1975 85 and compares the results with earlier u k and u s studies an examination of death rates shows that smaller companies had higher death rates but the largest and smallest companies were least vulnerable to takeover careful attention is therefore paid to problems of sample selection bias it is shown that smaller companies grew faster than larger companies that gibrat s law does not hold amongst smaller firms that age is negatively related to growth and that these results are not an artifact of sample selection bias copyright 1994 by blackwell publishing ltd

big business and urban congestion in taiwan the origins of small enterprise and regionally decentralized industry respectively abstract two pillars of taiwan s economy that are regarded as models for other developing countries to follow are small and medium size enterprises smes and regional decentralization of industry this paper suggests that the historical roots of both phenomena make the policies necessary to reproduce the taiwan model elsewhere less straightforward than is typically supposed by the mid 1960s the major factor behind regional decentralization was urban congestion big business seems to have been instrumental in the growth of smes

promoting technological capability in the capital goods sector the case of singapore abstract this paper contributes to the new interest in technological change in semi industrial countries by examining technological capability in the machine producing sector in singapore the difficulties involved in conceptualizing and measuring technological capability in less developed countries are discussed and the case study material is then presented particular attention is paid to the role of government promotion in the development of technological capability in this connection the present study provides a useful contrast with the position in hong kong studied in an earlier paper while both singapore and hong kong have instituted a near free trade regime there is a far greater degree of government intervention in the former than in the latter case by contrast the governments of both south korea and taiwan have granted selective protection in order to encourage some kinds of domestic machine production the paper ends with some critical comments regarding the singapore government s policy towards the machine producing sector

towards an understanding of technical change in semi industrialized countries in industrialized countries technical change in manufacturing pertains to cost reduction improvements in production processes and to the creation of new products in sic s semi industrialized countries which are characterized by protection market and information distortions and rationing technical change consists mostly of the adaptation of imported technologies to local conditions the firms operating in these countries try to optimize an objective function generally of profits or net worth under various constraints to some extent possibilities of substitution exist between directly productive and r d activities or between investment in new capital equipment and maintenance and modification activities to keep old machinery running and even expanding output most frequent constraints include credit rationing with severe limitations in the financing of working capital quotas for the supply of raw material inputs produced by the state import restrictions etc as far as import restrictions the relevant case seems to be not that of a high tariff but an outright prohibition of imports of certain materials or equipment as this will generally demand r d to modify the received technology the feasibility of doing so seems to depend strongly on the availability of the required technical skills

latecomer systems integration capability in complex capital goods the case of iran s electricity generation systems this article introduces the concept of latecomer systems integration capability lsic as a construct for theory development in the area of emergence and competitiveness of producers of complex capital goods from developing economies the study draws on three bodies of the literature to conceptualize lsic and then presents an in depth case study of the development of lsic in a major iranian firm engaged in producing electricity generation systems although an exploratory study the findings suggest that in this case lsic evolved in a fairly short period of time from simple low cost project management skills to innovative capabilities supported by some sophisticated engineering and design know how leading to successes in local and overseas markets the conclusion touches on the implications of the study for theory business strategy and policy

global financial instability framework events issues two of the key questions facing policymakers today are how to reduce the risk of global financial instability and how to cope with it when it occurs this paper starts by defining financial instability and then showing how it harms economic activity it then uses this framework to describe what happened during the recent financial crises in mexico and east asia the paper ends by raising several key policy issues not coincidentally these issues are addressed in the remaining papers in the symposium

technology exports from a small very open nic the case of singapore abstract this paper examines the nature composition and determinants of singapore s early stage technology exports the pattern of these exports reflects the quite unique mix of policy and institutional features in singapore s environment remarkably high growth very open economy rapid structural change particularly intense economic relations with neighboring southeast asian nations and a pervasive and paternalistic state role the bases of singapore s comparative advantage in these service exports are identified and some general implications from its experience are analyzed

do firms growth rates depend on firm size the empirical literature dealing with corporate growth does not in general give support to gibrat s law stating that the expected increase in firm size is proportionate to its initial size leaving their growth rates independent of size using a relatively large and representative sample of approximately 2 500 danish firms representing all industries we have evaluated the validity of gibrat s law over the period 1990 2004 the present analysis addresses this question by applying econometric methods to test gibrat s law and correcting for problems related to autocorrelation the empirical findings of our study do not generally support gibrat s law but in contrast to the results of earlier studies the analysis reveals that firms growth rates are more likely to be positively related to firm size

unemployment in interwar britain in a recent article two american authors benjamin and kochin 1979a argide that keynes was wrong in attributing much of the abnormally high unemployment of the interwar years to a deficiency of aggregate demand they claim to have discovered an alternative clue to the riddle of high unemployment in interwar britain and to be able to show that the persistently high rate of unemployment in interwar britain was due in large part not to deficient aggregate demand but to high unemployment insurance benefits relative to wages ibid p 474 the army of the unemployed standing watch in britain at the publication of the general theory was largely a volunteer army ibid in making their case benjamin and kochin present three sets of evidence the first is a regression of unemployment on a measure of the benefits to wages ratio the so called replacement ratio and on a measure of deviations of output from trend over the period 1920 38 the second set of evidence concerns the implication of the lower rate of unemployment among juveniles than among adults and the third set consists of the inferences to be drawn from the differences in the rate of unemployment between single and married women at different times all the bodies of evidence are used to support the hypothesis of the existence of an association between the replacement ratio and the level of unemployment but only the first namely the time series regression is used to establish the amount of unemployment to be explained in this way that amount is seen to depend on the specific values of the coefficients on the replacement term and on the output term in the regression table 1 reports the data which are used by benjamin and kochin the figures for output are for net national product q as given by feinstein 1972 for w benjamin and kochin derive a figure for average weekly earnings from the data for annual wage and salaries

building technological capacity a case study of the computer industry in india 1975 1987 abstract in this paper we will use the theoretical framework of hedonic price performance functions to demonstrate that the indian computer industry has succeeded in closing the price performance technology gap between mostly us produced micro and minicomputers and domestically fabricated micro and minimodels this paper tells the story of industrial policy changes that allowed an emerging domestic computer industry in india to obtain necessary technology inputs and that provided for an increasingly intense level of domestic competition we analyze the effect of two key factors access to technology and level of competition on the level of technological capabilities of the computer sector the paper uses india s experience with the computer industry to outline by inference a strategy for the successful acquisition of technology in a high technology industry by a newly industrializing country

imitative innovation and international joint ventures a dynamic analysis abstract in this paper we deal with some dynamic issues of international joint venture in the context of a developing country we provide a rationale for international joint venture formation as well as its subsequent instability where instability is interpreted as payoff readjustments between the partners in the venture although the joint venture is formed in response to government restrictions on foreign equity holdings in the first period its subsequent instability is caused by both the change in government policy as well as the outcome of imitative technological innovation undertaken by the host partner it is also shown that uncertainty about the government policy in the second period plays an important role in the formation of joint venture in the first period

still searching for an explanation of unemployment in interwar britain no man has hired us with pocketed hands and lowered faces we stand about in open places and shiver in unlit rooms only the wind moves over empty fields untilled where the plough rests at an angle to the furrow in this land there shall be one cigarette to two men to two women one half pint of bitter ale in this land no man has hired us our life is unwelcome our death unmentioned in the times t s eliot the rock 1934

learning and the capital goods sector under free trade the case of hongkong abstract attention is focused on technological change and attendant learning processes in the more industrialized third world countries the importance of relatively simple learning processes is stressed and the conditions necessary for facilitating more complex forms of learning particularly protection and promotion are examined here it is shown that the capital goods sector is of central importance the case study material deals with the machine producing sector in hong kong chosen as the representative case of free trade and minimal government intervention and comparison is made with learning processes in a number of other more industrialized third world countries including india argentina and taiwan in the final section the implications of the discussion of learning for theories and techniques of investment allocation including social cost benefit analysis the effective rate of protection and the related domestic cost of foreign exchange are examined

fostering the capital goods sector in ldcs abstract the conventional arguments in favour of the production of capital goods by ldcs are based on comparative advantage the possibility of designs appropriate to indigenous factor proportions and the externalities conferred on other sectors these and other arguments are inducing the governments of many middle income countries to more intensively foster the development of the machinery sector this paper examines the analytic and empirical bases of the conventional arguments and finds a considerably more complex picture than that contained in earlier studies

dual exchange markets for countries facing financial crises abstract in dual exchange markets there is an exchange market for capital transactions separate from the foreign exchange market for current transactions developing countries experiencing financial crises should avoid both a substantial decline in the exchange value of their currency and a reduction of their imports to the point at which their production and consumption of essentials are grossly impaired it is suggested that a temporary system of dual exchange markets will prevent capital outflow from reducing foreign exchange for imports of goods and services both markets should be free of exchange controls except those needed to maintain separation of the markets

international competitiveness technical change and the state the machine tool industry in taiwan and japan abstract it is widely accepted that the growth performance of japan and the asian newly industrialized countries hong kong singapore south korea and taiwan is partly the result of the international competitiveness they have achieved in a number of export industries it remains however to explain how this competitiveness was achieved in the first part of the paper an attempt at such an explanation based on the theory of comparative advantage is critically examined it is argued that while this explanation does have some explanatory power it does not deal adequately with a the role of technical and productivity change b the causal mechanisms underlying economic growth and c the role of the state the rest of the paper examines the case of machine tools in taiwan and japan showing the importance of these three factors as well as a number of others as determinants of international competitiveness the paper ends with a discussion of policy dilemmas relating to international competitiveness in the taiwanese machine toot industry

on matters methodological in economics books reviewed in this article lawrence a boland 1989 the methodology of economic model building methodology after samuelson j c glass and w johnson 1989 economics progression stagnation or degeneration arjo klamer donald n mccloskey and robert m solow eds 1989 the consequences of economic rhetoric brian j loasby 1989 the mind and method of the economist a critical appraisal of major economists in the 20th century john pheby 1988 methodology and economics a critical introduction

growth acquisition activity and firm size evidence from the united kingdom this paper provides new empirical evidence on the relationship between size growth and acquisition activity of quoted companies in the united kingdom the evidence is based on some two thousand companies and covers the period i960 76 there has been no detailed systematic study for this period the results suggest some revisions to generally accepted views in the area and they have certain implications for industrial and competition policy pursued in the u k and the factors affecting aggregate concentration the paper is arranged as follows section i considers the broader economic context for the study whilst section ii notes some a priori expectations regarding the relationship between size and growth and size and acquisition activity sections iii v present empirical evidence and the last section provides a summary and policy implications of the results

size growth and transnationality among the world s largest banks this essay investigates the relationship between size and growth rate of large international banks and then relates these to the banks degree of transnationality we test two sets of three propositions each the first three propositions are pi that the growth rate of each bank over some period is independent of its size p2 that the variability of growth rates is independent of the banks size and p3 that the banks growth rates in two consecutive periods are independent of each other the second three propositions are p4 that there is no association between size and transnationality p5 that transnationality and growth are independent and p6 that there is no relationship between transnationality and the variability of growth rates the growth referred to is primarily that of assets as a measure of size for the two propositions concerning the variability of growth rates we supplement this measure with one of the market value of the banks equity the results have implications for concentration in internathis paper investigates six propositions relating to gibrat s law of proportionate growth the growth referred to is that of book assets and total market value the results have implications for concentration in international banking and for depositor safety and the social cost of insuring it and provide evidence on economies of scale and on the transnational spread of the industry

foreign investment and economic development conflict and negotiation this paper is part survey part essay the survey consists of a partial review of the literature on the subject of foreign direct investment in developing countries with particular emphasis on conflict and its resolution through negotiation after a brief discussion of the objective functions guiding the strategies of both main actors the paper turns to a review of the substantive and institutional context surrounding the negotiation process between multinational firms and host countries next follow some general principles common to most negotiations drawn from the experience obtained in other fields and a discussion of the relevant literature on international business negotiations last the essay integrates the various threads of analysis into a series of normative conclusions which while not pretending to be imperial are offered as challenges for further study

the mainspring of economic growth lecture to the memory of alfred nobel april 27 1973 this abstract was borrowed from another version of this item

latecomer firm strategies in complex product systems cops the case of iran s thermal electricity generation systems this paper examines the strategies of a local supplier of high technology capital goods or complex product systems cops in a middle income developing economy iran in its efforts to acquire technology and catch up with market leaders the study draws upon both the development and business strategy literatures to develop a novel conceptual framework of latecomer strategy which is then applied to the iranian firm engaged in the design production and implementation of electricity generation systems although exploratory the study shows that the firm was able to exploit its linkages with local clients favorable government policies and a growing domestic demand to overcome barriers to entry and learn how to manufacture and design complex power generation systems this paper contributes to the catch up literature by highlighting the insights that a latecomer strategy perspective can provide into catch up in cops noting in particular differences between strategies of catch up in the iranian case with those of asian electronics and complex goods in latin america and the reasons behind an imbalanced progress in accumulation of production capabilities and technological change capabilities the evidence shows the importance of marketing capabilities and strategy in cops in order for the transition to leadership to take place implications for policy and strategy are discussed and opportunities for further research are outlined

total factor productivity growth technological progress and technical efficiency change dimensions of productivity change in yugoslavia 1965 1978 this article total factor productivity growth technological progress and technical efficiency change dimensions of productivity change in yugoslavia 1965 78 was reprinted with permission from the december 1982 issue of the economic journal this article proposes a methodology that decomposes total factor productivity change into two distinct elements technological progress and changes in technical efficiency technological progress is defined as the change in the best practice production frontier all other productivity change is attributed to technical efficiency change the article provides a theoretical framework for decomposing total factor productivity growth as well as a specification and estimation of the deterministic frontier production function it employs a programming technique to estimate a flexible functional form of the production frontier the paper then applies this technique to empirical data from yugoslavia of the period from 1965 to 1978 it concludes that for yugoslavia improvements to technical efficiency comprise the dominant contribution to total factor productivity change this agrees with accumulating evidence that in many developing economies productivity gain due to technological mastery of imported technology is substantial

the division of labour is limited by the rate of growth of the market the taiwan machine tool industry in the 1970s in 1974 i visited taiwan to make a study of its machine tool industry amsden 1977 late in 1981 i returned to visit the same factories i had visited seven years earlier in the interim taiwan was transformed from an amateurish supplier of machine tools to southeast asia into the fourth largest exporter of machine tools to the united states cremeans and dalton 1982 this paper analyses the remarkable changes which occurred in the machine tool industry in this short period the object is to study the process of capital accumulation in one industry in a newly industrialising country in order to gain a better understanding of the nature of the process generally between 1970 and 1980 machine tool production in taiwan rose by more than eleven times see table 1 one way to begin to understand the process of capital accumulation is to ask how such an extraordinarily rapid increase in demand alters the nature of production this is the focus adopted in what follows most historians acknowledge a phenomenon of cumulative causation in economic development or decline economies which begin to grow rapidly tend to grow even more rapidly but once growth falters there ensues a self reinforcing downward spiral most economists however recognise only one part of this cumulative process that which runs from technological progress typically taken as exogenous to increases in productivity to increases in output what tends to be ignored is that part which runs from increases in output to increases in productivity with technological change broadly defined sandwiched in between it is this which is examined below

acquisition of technological capability in development a quantitative case study of pakistan s capital goods sector there is by now a substantial body of literature that points to the importance of technological capability acquisition for industrial development this literature however is almost exclusively based on qualitative case studies this paper addresses the lack of objective quantitative measurement and testing using data from a survey among capital goods manufacturers in pakistan it develops quantitative proxies for technological capability and various learning mechanisms that are believed to contribute to its emergence these are used in a regression analysis aimed at finding statistical support for the contention in the literature that capability results from an effortful learning process and at analyzing the main dimensions of that process

inside the black box technology and economics economists have long treated technological phenomena as events transpiring inside a black box and on the whole have adhered rather strictly to a self imposed ordinance not to inquire too seriously into what transpires inside that box the purpose of professor rosenberg s work is to break open and examine the contents of the black box in so doing a number of important economic problems be powerfully illuminated the author clearly shows how specific features of individual technologies have shaped a number of variables of great concern to economists the rate of productivity improvement the nature of learning processes underlying technological change itself the speed of technology transfer and the effectiveness of government policies that are intended to influence technologies in particular ways the separate chapters of this book reflect a primary concern with some of the distinctive aspects of industrial technologies in the twentieth century such as the increasing reliance upon science but also the considerable subtlety and complexity of the dialectic between science and technology other concerns include the rapid growth in the development of costs associated with new technologies as well as the difficulty of predicting the eventual performance characteristics of newly emerging technologies

economic and environmental benefits of eliminating log export bans the case of costa rica an increasing number of tropical timber producing nations have enacted bans on export of logs arguing that this will reduce deforestation expand downstream wood processing and improve the scale efficiency of domestic processing create jobs and retain more value added nationally the theoretical literature is clear that trade restrictions are generally welfare reducing except in special cases such as when there is a potential for an optimal export tax at best a log export ban is a second best policy tool for reducing deforestation and addressing the associated environmental externalities in overall terms the suggestion that log export bans can achieve the objectives expected of them is dubious however very little quantitative evidence exists to demonstrate this claim and the paper attempts to address this gap by looking at the economic and environmental impacts of eliminating a log export ban in costa rica the authors argue that eliminating the export ban is pareto improving and could generate economic gains as high as 14 million per annum with the possibility of relatively modest environmental benefits

the logic of testing structural change in meat demand a methodological analysis and appraisal in the past two decades the profession has expended valuable resources testing structural change in meat demand with mixed results overlooked to date is a fundamental methodological problem that transcends all methods of testing for structural change in this study a methodological framework is used to show that there is no valid test of structural change because of this result additional criteria from the methodology literature are used to evaluate the literature on structural change in meat demand and to provide suggestions for fertile areas of future research

sources of imitation improving bank process capabilities abstract this paper argues that imitators are more likely than innovators to use a wider variety of channels for improving their process capabilities and that the sources of imitation are more informal or non market mediated than formal yet the search for know how is a variegated process even within the same industry these variations stem from factors other than industry specific technical requirements regulatory intervention has important implications for firm history skill bases size and competitive focus taken together these background elements guide firms from the same industry towards somewhat different sources of know how the case under study is banking a service industry rarely considered in the literature on technical change

is the accumulation of international reserves good for development international reserves accumulation has been the preferred policy recently adopted by developing economies to achieve financial stability the aim of this policy is to increase liquidity and thus reduce the risk of suffering a speculative attack the main concern expressed in the literature has been related to its cost most of the studies conclude that the opportunity cost of international reserves accumulation is around 1 of gdp however these studies have not analysed whether this strategy is or could be more broadly supportive of development an issue that must be of central interest for developing economies the aim of this paper is to show that the stockpiling of international reserves is not optimal for developmental purposes and that there exist alternative policies that can be applied to achieve financial stability policy autonomy and a better performance in terms of development

growth beyond gibrat firm growth processes and strategies firm growth studies have been focused on the question of whether firm growth is independent of firm size this shadow of gibrat s law has drawn attention to the randomness in firm growth however it has also clouded relevant research avenues that enquire into the role of firm growth processes and strategies this paper takes stock of the current state of the art of firm growth studies in small business economics and makes a plea for more specific research approaches that highlight the nature of the firm organization and growth paths this rejuvenation of firm growth studies comprises a search for necessary mechanisms and contingent conditions for the growth of firms

economics and underdetermination a case study of urban land and housing economics underdetermination associated with the duhem quine thesis is a familiar if under researched theme in economics in the light of this we examine the development of urban land and housing economics through its cartesian dualistic delineation of theory and data the contemporary mainstream approach appears unable to circumvent the problem of underdetermination in effect it employs the strong version of duhem quine in its retention of the assumption of a single unitary competitive market and associated access space trade off conversely we highlight the affinity of ely s and the later columbia school s approach to pragmatists dewey and peirce which provides a more fruitful basis for explanation

science and technology indicators country size and economic development an international comparison abstract conceptual and data problems make the selection of science and technology indicators difficult it has also proven hard to link measures of scientific and technological activity with economic development in this paper statistically significant results are obtained in regressing two input indicators stock of scientists and engineers and expenditures in research and experimental development with population size and income per capita the models adjusted include non linearities and are structurally different country groupings thus the practice of utilizing average coefficients and of applying their values to both industrialized and developing countries does not seem justified the econometrically established pattern tends to corroborate prior knowledge about highly qualified human resource availability and expenditures in r d in outlier countries performing both above and below the norm

firm size and technical efficiency applications of production frontiers to indian survey data abstract this paper is an empirical investigation of the relationship between relative technical efficiency and firm size in four indian manufacturing industries a frontier translog production function is used to derive measures of technical inefficiency at the enterprise level given the properties of the estimated production frontier these indices of technical efficiency are also indices of total factor productivity tfp which is the single most widely accepted measure of productive efficiency variations in technical efficiency are correlated with several explanatory variables including size of firm firm size is found to be positively associated with relative productive efficiency in only one of the four industries

the urban rural divide regional disaggregation and the convergence of crime potential regional variation in crime rates has been recognized as an issue of clear importance given its implications for the development and evaluation of theories of criminal activity determining the appropriate level of disaggregation at which to undertake empirical analyses of crime and whether crime fighting policies should be constructed at a national or local level consequently a literature has evolved examining the similarities in us regional crime rates and whether a national trend exists or is emerging the present article extends the recent research into the emergence of a national trend by considering convergence in alternative classifications of crime using a data set subject to a higher degree of disaggregation than considered hitherto the results obtained overturn previous findings obtained using more highly aggregated data indicating the detection of convergence to be dependent upon the level of disaggregation considered in addition the extent of convergence detected is shown to va

the emergence of third world multinationals indian joint ventures overseas abstract the more industrialized ldcs are emerging increasingly as exporters of capital or of technology in several forms this paper draws on the recent experience of indian mncs to reexamine the factors which give rise to third world multinationals the author summarizes the current state of research in the analysis of ldcs mncs drawing upon specific mnc literature and other related literature on trade and technology he deals with the evidence on indian capital exports placing it in the broader context of technology exports discussing some examples of interest and drawing comparisons with foreign investment by some other ldcs he assesses the indian experience using the distinctions drawn by dunning s eclectic theory but concentrating on the processes of technical change that underline the growth of its mncs the final section draws some tentative conclusions

how much voluntary unemployment in interwar britain in a recent issue of this journal daniel benjamin and levis kochin argue that the prolonged high unemployment in interwar britain was due to the operation of an unemployment insurance scheme that paid benefits that were high relative to wages and available subject to few restrictions we estimate that the insurance system raised the unemployment rate by five to eight percentage points on average and that in the absence of the system unemployment would have been at normal levels through much of the period benjamin and kochin 1979 p 441 the point of this note is to suggest that the bold claim made by benjamin and kochin is flawed by their almost complete failure to take account of the genuinely seeking work and meanstest clauses which were actively used in much of the 1921 38 period to disqualify many of the unemployed from receipt of benefit and by their unconvincing dismissal of the reverse causation argument that many of the increases in liberality of unemployment insurance provision resulted directly and indirectly from increases in unemployment rather than vice versa

the post entry performance of new small firms in german manufacturing industries while recent years have witnessed a growing interest in research on market entry by new firms evidence regarding their postentry performance is scarce this paper uses longitudinal data for small firms that entered german manufacturing industries between 1979 and 1982 and monitors their performance until 1990 entrants face a high risk of failure hazard rates tend to increase during the first years and to decrease afterwards decline of employment in a cohort due to exits and shrinking firms is compensated by growing survivors no clear cut nexus between start up size and probability of survival shows up copyright 1994 by blackwell publishing ltd

the duhem quine thesis lakatos and the appraisal of theories in macroeconomics the point of this paper is to outline the implications of the duhem quine thesis for the task of appraising theories in economics the duhem quine thesis dqfrom now on states that it is not possible to falsify single hypotheses because it is invariably conjunctions of hypotheses which are being tested thus if a particular hypothesis is found to be in conflict with some piece of empirical evidence all that we can say is that the conjunction of the particular hypothesis with a set of auxiliary hypotheses is false we can never be sure that it is not one or more of the auxiliary hypotheses which is responsible for the anomalous empirical evidence rather than the particular hypothesis in which we are most interested expressed in symbols this means that arguments of the form ho 0 0 ho are not justified where ho is a particular hypothesis o is the observational evidence and the symbols and mean imply conjoined with and not instead our arguments can only justifiably be phrased in the form g1 0 0 g1 where g1 is a conjunction of hypotheses which contains ho there could well be some different conjunction of hypotheses gn which contains ho which is consistent with the empirical evidence the contention of this paper is that many of the debates in macroeconomics have been misguided in that the jointness of hypothesis testing has been ignored by participants in the debates instead the focus of attention has been on the appraisal of single target hypotheses considered in isolation from supportive auxiliary hypotheses the implicit assumption being that it is possible to falsify single target hypotheses the latter assumption is wrong following the logic of the dq thesis we are obliged to conduct our appraisal at the level of groupings of hypotheses that is to appraise any target hypothesis in conjunction with its supportive auxiliary hypotheses the implications of this line of reasoning are perhaps best unravelled in the context of concrete examples from debates in macroeconomics over the last two decades before moving to this task we will in section i provide a brief outline of the history of the dq thesis section ii will then illustrate the misguidedness of appraising target hypotheses in isolation from their supportive auxiliary hypotheses with reference to the often heated and continuing debate regarding the stability of the demand for money function the question of how to appraise groupings of hypotheses is considered in section iii here we will centre the

farm size and growth in canada in this paper we empirically examine the relationship between farm size and growth in canada over the period 1966 81 the analysis is undertaken by testing gibrat s law of proportionate effect gibrat offered the hypothesis that the percentage growth rates of firms are independent of their initial size thus growth is a purely stochastic process that arises from the cumulative effect of the random operation of a multitude of forces acting independently of each other an important outcome of models based on gibrat s law is that the stochastic process results in a size distribution of firms which is skewed and not unlike the size distribution actually observed in particular it is well known that depending on the precise formulation the operation of gibrat s law leads to a skewed size distribution which is either log normal prais or pareto steindl ijiri and simon although it is difficult to determine the exact form of observed size distributions it is generally agreed that either of the above provides a reasonable approximation to reality depending on the industry or sector being observed by contrast a deterministic model of firm growth based strictly on standard cost theory either predicts the facts incorrectly or it makes no prediction at all ijiri and simon p 10 although there are models combining cost theory with assumptions about the adjustment process which result in skewed size distributions e g lucas the testing of gibrat s law remains as an important point of departure for the analysis of firm growth an additional feature of models based on

econometrics and business cycle empirics business cycle empirics have long been a central arena for the debate about the roles of economic theory and econometrics in modelling economic time series data some famous historical examples are moore i9i4 keynes i939 and koopmans i947 sources for potential disagreements include that the entire economic system is involved and unobservable stochastic forces seem more than usually prominent in determining the outcome not only do these constitute two aspects about which it is hard to theorise they are equally difficult to model empirically there are both positive arguments for and negative arguments against according a dominant role to either theory or evidence not least because it is unclear what constitutes admissible instances of either in the absence of the other we first review what precludes a purely theoretical approach what prevents a purely empirical approach and hence why an interactive approach is imperative even so both the relative importance of the two ingredients and their substantive contents are likely to remain at issue first concerning the economy considerable empirical evidence suggests that it is a dynamic non linear high dimensional and evolving entity so studying it is difficult society and social systems alter over time laws change and technological innovations occur so establishing any invariants of an economic system is not easy such difficulties adversely afflict both theory and empirical modelling secondly concerning the observations time series data in economics are heterogeneous non stationary time dependent and interdependent so it is difficult to acquire knowledge from the available empirical information again such factors also make it hard to theorise about the properties of the underlying system a more direct critique of the empirical enterprise is that samples are short and highly aggregated economic magnitudes are inaccurately measured are subject to considerable revision and important variables are not measured or are unobservable so inferences are both imprecise and tentative combined with the simultaneity non constancy and high dimensionality of economic data a purely empirical approach seems to many to be precluded other criticisms of econometric approaches include worries about data mining pretest biases a lack of genuine identifiability and collinearity sometimes combined with a belief that theory can compensate an overemphasis on a

policies for industrial progress in developing countries this book is a collection of essays by a distinguished group of authors who have had practical experience with industrial policy in both developing and industrialized countries the essays analyze the principal policies that influence the course and pace of industrialization and identify the practical constraints on policy formulation the book is intended primarily for administrators and decisionmakers to assist them in choosing among policy alternatives it is accordingly organized along lines of govenmental administrative responsibility with chapters on trade finance labor and technology taxation licensing and other controls public enterprises infrastructure and the location of industry as well as industrial links with agriculture and the international environment the use of mathematics and sophisticated models has been avoided in this attempt to bridge the chasm between theoretical concepts and the practical formulation policy

unification of dual exchange markets abstract this paper develops the model of an economy under a dual exchange system comprising an official market with a crawling exchange rate and a free market with a floating exchange rate after analyzing the behavior of the economy under the dual system the paper discusses the effects that switching to a unified floating system or a unified crawling peg system has on the exchange rate and on the balance of payments particularly in the short run the paper shows that these effects depend on the composition of the private sector s portfolio at the time of unification which in turn depends on the various policies that were followed while the economy was under the dual system

technology creation in semi industrial economies abstract technological activities in the semi industrial economies of latin america leading to the adaptation of imported technologies as well as the development of new products and processes have been both an involuntary byproduct of manufacturing activities and the result of deliberate decisions to set up technological research facilities technological research reported by latin american firms is shown to be largely complementary to production and carried out to reap the extra benefits of protection external effects are thus disregarded since the benefits from industrial production suffice to induce the requisite adaptive research the paper suggests that the as yet not well understood interaction between industrial and technological development be studied by focusing on technology as information and engineers as its processors looking at the learning stages from using imports to the creation of new products and examining these processes in terms of a progression toward increasing technological complexity

new developments in trade theory and ldcs abstract this paper surveys the new literature on international trade relevant to the north south controversy in the first part two types of north south models are considered the unequal exchange theory of lewis and emmanuel and the models of dynamic interaction of findlay taylor and others the analysis focuses on the determinants of growth the terms of trade and relative employment in the world economy in the second part the paper reviews the empirical literature on south north and south south trade and the theories of north south technological gaps intra industry trade and external economies finally we analyze the literature on exports and economic growth and the neo classical keynesian and disequilibrium approaches to the theory of import controls

the international economics of intellectual property right protection a welfare theoretic trade policy analysis abstract this paper provides an analytical construct for examining the trade policy effects of greater intellectual property protection in technology importing countries it is shown that two types of conflict are likely to arise between net technology importers and exporters the first relates to the level of protection with importers preferring a low level and exporters a high one the second conflict hitherto unexplored relates to the manner of protection with importers likely to prefer discriminatory regimes favoring local r d creation whereas exporters would prefer nondiscriminatory protection in importing countries

the relationship between firm growth and labor demand several american studies have recently estimated models of employment growth from longitudinal data sets of business firms evans 1987 leonard 1986 hall 1987 by and large these studies find that the growth rate of employment is inversely correlated with initial size measured by employment and with age young firms tend to grow more rapidly than old ones these studies have cast considerable doubt on gibrat s law or the assumption of independence between firm size and the rate of growth however departures from gibrat s law are modest especially among firms above minimum size recently a group of researchers has proceeded along similar lines of investigation using data from a panel of italian manufacturing firms located in northern italy the purpose of this paper is to compare our results with those obtained for the u s and to explore in more detail the soundness of this approach our results are similar to the abovementioned american studies we find that departures from gibrat s law are not large

new patterns of governance for industrial change perspectives for brazil brazil is one of many developing countries that are struggling to upgrade their industries to attain international competitiveness sustained industrial competitiveness this article argues rests not only on firms capabilities micro level and a stable economic framework macro level but also and in particular on a tissue of supporting sector specific and specialised institutions and targeted policies meso level and on governance structures that facilitate problem solving between state and societal actors meta level the concept of systemic competitiveness seeks to address the interrelationship between the four levels the article analyses various obstacles to achieving systemic competitiveness in the particular case of brazil

a multi stream analysis of the changing pattern of interregional migration in great britain 1960 1991 gordon i and molho i 1998 a multi stream analysis of the changing pattern of interregional migration in great britain 1960 1991 reg studies 32 309 323 this paper uses a combination of spatial and econometric modelling techniques to investigate longer term patterns and processes of change in british interregional migration starting from a distinction between an employment oriented national movement stream and a housing and environment related regional stream the two major influences on the longer distance flows are found to be relative rates of employment growth and perceived environmental quality but while the former induces marked fluctuations within the observation period the influence of the latter factor shows little variation with no sign of a clean break there is however evidence of a sharply reduced responsiveness of migration to unemployment differentials since the mid 1970s gordon i et molho i 1998 une analyse a flux multiples de l evolution de la distribution de la mi

does gibrat s law hold evidence from canadian retail and manufacturing firms this paper investigates the validity of gibrat s law holding for firms in manufacturing and retail trade sectors the object is to expand our knowledge of gibrat s law to include non manufacturing firms a unique longitudinal firm level database which contains information on canadian incorporated establishments enables the inter industry comparison the findings of the analysis are that gibrat s law is violated in both manufacturing and retail sectors violations of gibrat s law for both sectors include i growth rates that depend on firm size ii growth variability that depends on firm size and iii a negative persistence of firm growth finally age effects or selection effects are not the causes of these violations

exports of technology from semi industrial economies and local technological development abstract this paper analyzes technology exports from five of the most industrially advanced developing countries argentina brazil india korea and mexico it explores the nature of the exports and of the exporting firms identifies the competitive advantage underlying different types of technology exports and analyzes the comparative advantages of the five countries in these exports based on an analysis of different strategies toward the trade in the elements of technology it summarizes tentative lessons about relationships between trade in the elements of technology country and firm strategy and local technological development