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  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2013031
    Description:

    This paper describes the evolution of the Multifactor Productivity Program launched at Statistics Canada in 1987 and the improvements made in multifactor productivity measurement since then. The improvements were made in response to developments in the economic literature, better data sources, and the needs of the user community. The paper also summarizes research that uses alternate data and methodologies to assess the accuracy of the Multifactor Productivity Program and to provide insights into areas that traditional international multifactor productivity programs omit. Finally, the paper outlines future directions that are being contemplated to further improve the measurement of productivity at Statistics Canada.

    Release date: 2013-05-28

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2010027
    Description:

    Measures of productivity are derived by comparing outputs and inputs. The System of National Accounts (SNA) in Canada provides a useful framework for organizing the information required for comparisons of this type. Integrated systems of economic accounts provide coherent, consistent alternate estimates of the various concepts that can be used to measure productivity.

    Release date: 2010-06-29

  • Articles and reports: 15-206-X2009025
    Description:

    Baldwin and Gu (2008) provide an overview of the productivity program at Statistics Canada and a brief description of Canada's productivity performance. This paper provides an update of Canada's productivity performance in more recent years and analyses the sources of weak productivity performance in Canada since 2000.

    Release date: 2009-08-04

  • Articles and reports: 15-206-X2008021
    Description:

    This paper makes use of a growth accounting framework to examine the importance of public capital for private sector productivity growth. Most measures of multifactor productivity consider only the inputs of the business sector. This paper produces an alternate measure of multifactor productivity for the business sector that incorporates the impact of public capital. It uses the estimate of the elasticity of business sector output with respect to public capital derived from Macdonald (2008). Over the period, the conventional estimate of MFP growth averages 0.4% per year. About half of this growth is attributable to public capital.

    Release date: 2009-01-14

  • Articles and reports: 15-206-X2008022
    Description:

    Many historical comparisons of international productivity use measures of labour productivity (output per worker). Differences in labour productivity can be caused by differences in technical efficiency or differences in capital intensity. Moving to measures of total factor productivity allows international comparisons to ascertain whether differences in labour productivity arise from differences in efficiency or differences in factors utilized in the production process.

    This paper examines differences in output per worker in the manufacturing sectors of Canada and the United States in 1929 and the extent to which it arises from efficiency differences. It makes corrections for differences in capital and materials intensity per worker in order to derive a measure of total factor efficiency of Canada relative to the United States, using detailed industry data. It finds that while output per worker in Canada was only about 75% of the United States productivity level, the total factor productivity measure of Canada was about the same as the United States level - that is, there was very little difference in technical efficiency in the two countries. Canada's lower output per worker was the result of the use of less capital and materials per worker than the United States.

    Release date: 2008-12-23

  • Articles and reports: 11F0027M2008053
    Geography: Canada
    Description:

    This paper examines firm turnover and productivity growth in the Canadian retail trade sector. Firm turnover occurs as the competitive process shifts market share from exiting firms and existing firms that contracted to entering firms and existing firms that expanded. There is considerably more firm turnover in the retail sector than in the manufacturing sector and more of it comes from entry and exit. Moreover, contrary to the manufacturing sector where only part of overall productivity growth comes from firm turnover and the re-allocation of resources from the less to the more productive, all of the aggregate productivity growth comes from this source in the retail sector. This suggests that the much-discussed Wal-Mart effect on retail sector productivity mainly comes from the Wal-Mart-created competitive pressure that shifts market share from exitors and declining incumbents to entrants and growing incumbents. Foreign-controlled firms contributed 30% of labour productivity growth and 45% of multifactor productivity growth in the retail trade sector in the period from 1984 to 1996, which are mainly due to the entry of foreign-controlled firms and expansion of more productive foreign-controlled existing firms.

    Release date: 2008-12-08

  • Articles and reports: 15-206-X2008020
    Description:

    This paper compares the productivity growth of a set of Canadian and U.S. regulated industries. Using data from Statistics Canada's KLEMS database and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the paper examines productivity growth in transportation services (which includes air and rail), broadcasting and telecommunications, and financial services (which includes financial intermediation and insurance), over the period from 1977 to 2003. The majority of these provide the foundational networks on which other industries rely. These sectors were quite heavily regulated in Canada at the beginning of the period of study (1977), experienced partial deregulation during the period and still faced various types of regulation at the end (2003). Deregulation also occurred in the United States, but regulation has generally been less restrictive there over most of the period.

    The evidence shows that many of the Canadian industries that underwent deregulation experienced faster labour productivity growth and multifactor productivity growth than did the aggregate Canadian business sector and had similar or higher productivity growth than did their counterparts in the United States over the 1977-to-2003 period. Those industries include rail transportation, broadcasting and telecommunications, financial intermediation and insurance carriers. The airline industry had slower productivity growth in Canada than in the United States over the 1977-to-2003 period.

    Release date: 2008-11-26

  • Articles and reports: 15-206-X2008019
    Description:

    This paper has three main objectives. First, it examines the level of multifactor productivity (MFP) in Canada relative to that of the United States for the 1994-to-2003 period. Second, it examines the relative importance of differences in capital intensity and MFP in accounting for the labour productivity differences between the two countries. Third, it traces the overall MFP difference between Canada and the United States to its industry origins and estimates the contributions of the goods, services and engineering sectors to the overall MFP gap.

    Our main findings are as follows. First, the overall capital intensity is as high in Canada as in the United States; but there are considerable differences in Canada's capital intensity across asset classes. Canada has considerably less machinery and equipment, about the same amount of buildings and considerably more engineering construction. Second, most of the differences in labour productivity between Canada and the United States are due to the differences in MFP. Third, our industry results show that the levels of labour productivity and MFP in the goods and the engineering sectors are closer to those of the United States. But, the level of labour and multifactor productivity in the services sector is much lower in Canada. The lower levels of labour productivity and MFP in the Canadian services sector account for most of the overall productivity level difference between the two countries.

    Release date: 2008-07-21

  • Articles and reports: 11F0027M2008050
    Geography: Canada
    Description:

    This paper examines whether or not the long-term government bond rate could reasonably be employed as the rate of return on public capital when calculating public sector gross domestic product. It finds that the rate of return on public capital is lower than often reported and is roughly consistent with the rate of return on private capital. Given that there is a range of estimates that are plausible, the paper concludes that the long-run government bond rate could be used as a conservative estimate for the rate of return for public infrastructure.

    Previous studies have shown that production function estimates tend to find rates of return that are implausibly large, while cost function estimates appear more reasonable. This paper shows that public capital and total factor productivity (TFP) growth behave similarly, and argues that production function estimates for the impact of public capital overstate its impact as a result, catching part of what belongs in estimates of TFP. It also shows that the similarity between the growth in public capital and TFP leads to a large confidence interval around public capital elasticity estimates derived from the production function framework. The paper then proceeds by generating a confidence interval from the production function estimated first with and then without TFP growth. It then uses a cost function to pinpoint more precisely estimates for the marginal cost savings from public capital. Importantly, the estimate derived from the cost function is found in the lower part of the confidence interval derived from the production function. The rate of return associated with the overlapping estimates is then shown to cover a range that extends from the average long-run government bond rate to the rate of return on private capital.

    Release date: 2008-04-15

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2008017
    Description:

    This paper provides an overview of the productivity program at Statistics Canada and a brief description of Canada's productivity performance. The paper defines productivity and the various measures that are used to investigate different aspects of productivity growth. It describes the difference between partial productivity measures (such as labour productivity) and a more complete measure (multifactor productivity) and the advantages and disadvantages of each. The paper explains why productivity is important. It outlines how productivity growth fits into the growth accounting framework and how this framework is used to examine the various sources of economic growth. The paper briefly discusses the challenges that face statisticians in measuring productivity growth. It also provides an overview of Canada's long-term productivity performance and compares Canada to the United States - both in terms of productivity levels and productivity growth rates.

    Release date: 2008-02-25
Data (1)

Data (1) ((1 result))

  • Data Visualization: 71-607-X2021011
    Description:

    The Multifactor Productivity application is an analytical tool that provides custom aggregation and custom tabulation of productivity statistics based on the series in CODR table 36-10-0211. The application permits custom aggregation across industries for all published variables, data transformations such as growth rate calculations, log-transformations and index re-basing, correlation and density analysis and visualization of retrieved outputs. The output values from calculations are available as .csv files. Visualizations can be downloaded as .png files. The data in the application are annual values beginning in 1961 and ending with the most recent data available.

    Release date: 2021-08-16
Analysis (24)

Analysis (24) (20 to 30 of 24 results)

  • Articles and reports: 11F0027M2004025
    Geography: Canada
    Description:

    Productivity growth in the U.S. economy jumped during the second half of the 1990s, a resurgence that the literature linked to information technology use. This report contributes to this debate in two ways. First, using the most comparable Canadian and U.S. data available, the contributions of information technology to output, capital input, and productivity performance are quantified. Second, the report examines the extent to which information technology-producing and information technology-using industries have contributed to the aggregate multifactor productivity revival.

    Release date: 2004-11-23

  • Articles and reports: 11F0027M2003010
    Geography: Canada
    Description:

    This research paper explores the productivity gap between Canada and the United States. It constructs a North American frontier for the business sector and manufacturing sectors based on data from the two countries.

    Release date: 2003-03-31

  • Journals and periodicals: 15-204-X
    Description:

    Productivity growth in Canada (PGC), is the reference publication on productivity in Canada. The objective of this publication is twofold: a) to illustrate the importance of productivity trends on the changes in living standards in Canada and, b) to measure the productivity performance of the Canadian economy in comparison with the United States, in particular. PGC includes articles on productivity and related issues and serves as a vehicle to understanding the sources underlying economic growth in Canada.

    Release date: 2003-02-14

  • Articles and reports: 75-001-X19950011780
    Geography: Canada
    Description:

    When productivity increases in a sector, does it mean employment growth? This article explores the question and introduces a new concept: multifactor productivity.

    Release date: 1995-03-08
Reference (9)

Reference (9) ((9 results))

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2013031
    Description:

    This paper describes the evolution of the Multifactor Productivity Program launched at Statistics Canada in 1987 and the improvements made in multifactor productivity measurement since then. The improvements were made in response to developments in the economic literature, better data sources, and the needs of the user community. The paper also summarizes research that uses alternate data and methodologies to assess the accuracy of the Multifactor Productivity Program and to provide insights into areas that traditional international multifactor productivity programs omit. Finally, the paper outlines future directions that are being contemplated to further improve the measurement of productivity at Statistics Canada.

    Release date: 2013-05-28

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2010027
    Description:

    Measures of productivity are derived by comparing outputs and inputs. The System of National Accounts (SNA) in Canada provides a useful framework for organizing the information required for comparisons of this type. Integrated systems of economic accounts provide coherent, consistent alternate estimates of the various concepts that can be used to measure productivity.

    Release date: 2010-06-29

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2008017
    Description:

    This paper provides an overview of the productivity program at Statistics Canada and a brief description of Canada's productivity performance. The paper defines productivity and the various measures that are used to investigate different aspects of productivity growth. It describes the difference between partial productivity measures (such as labour productivity) and a more complete measure (multifactor productivity) and the advantages and disadvantages of each. The paper explains why productivity is important. It outlines how productivity growth fits into the growth accounting framework and how this framework is used to examine the various sources of economic growth. The paper briefly discusses the challenges that face statisticians in measuring productivity growth. It also provides an overview of Canada's long-term productivity performance and compares Canada to the United States - both in terms of productivity levels and productivity growth rates.

    Release date: 2008-02-25

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2007014
    Description:

    The Canadian Productivity Accounts (CPA) of Statistics Canada maintain two multifactor productivity (MFP) programs.

    The Major Sector Multifactor Productivity Program develops the indexes of MFP for the total business sector and major industry groups in the business sector.

    The Industry Multifactor Productivity Program or the Industry KLEMS Productivity Program develops the industry productivity database that includes MFP indexes, output, capital (K), labour (L), energy (E), materials (M) and services (S) inputs for the individual industries of the business sector at various levels of industry aggregation. This paper describes the methodologies and data sources that are used to construct the major sector MFP indexes and the industry productivity database (or the KLEMS database). More specifically, this paper is meant to:provide a background of the major sector MFP program and the industry KLEMS productivity program;present the methodology for measuring MFP;describe the data sources and data available from the MFP programs;present a quality rating of the industry KLEMS productivity data; anddescribe the research agenda related to the MFP program.

    Release date: 2007-12-06

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-206-X2007009
    Description:

    This paper examines the effects of alternative specifications of the user costs of capital on the estimated price and volume indices of capital services. It asks how sensitive the results are to the use of exogenous versus endogenous rates of return, to alternate ways of including capital gains, and to whether corrections are made for tax rates. The paper also examines the effect of the various user cost formulae on the measured multifactor productivity growth.

    Release date: 2007-04-04

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 11F0026M2005004
    Description:

    A statistical agency faces several challenges in building Productivity Accounts. Measures of productivity require that outputs be compared to inputs.

    This paper discusses the challenges that a statistical agency faces in this area -as illustrated by the Canadian experience. First, it examines the progress that has been made in developing a system that integrates the Productivity Accounts into the overall System of National Accounts. It also discusses deficiencies that still need to be overcome. Finally, the paper focuses on the need to consider whether the SNA manual should be extended into the area of productivity measurement. The paper argues that the advantage of integrating productivity accounts into the general accounts is sufficiently great that it is time to include more detail on the nature of productivity accounts in the general SNA framework.

    Release date: 2005-04-28

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 15-002-M2001001
    Description:

    This document describes the sources, concepts and methods utilized by the Canadian Productivity Accounts and discusses how they compare with their U.S. counterparts.

    Release date: 2004-12-24

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 11F0026M2004002
    Description:

    This paper discusses the productivity program at Statistics Canada, covering topics such as international efforts to provide more comparable statistics, attempts to expand our knowledge of the factors behind productivity growth, and challenges facing the program.

    Release date: 2004-08-06

  • Surveys and statistical programs – Documentation: 11F0026M2004001
    Description:

    This paper describes how the analytical program of Statistics Canada's productivity group is used to enhance the quality (relevance, coherence, interpretability) of its products.

    Release date: 2004-07-08
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