Technical Efficiency in Korea: Interindustry Determinants and Dynamic Stability

기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)의 결정요인(決定要因)과 동태적(動態的) 변화(變化)

  • Published : 1990.12.31

Abstract

This paper, a sequel to Yoo and Lee (1990), attempts to investigate the interindustry determinants of technical efficiency in Korea's manufacturing industries, and also to conduct an exploratory analysis on the stability of technical efficiency over time. The hypotheses set forth in this paper are most found in the existing literature on technical efficiency. They are, however, revised and shed a new light upon, whenever possible, to accommodate any Korea-specific conditions. The set of regressors used in the cross-sectional analysis are chosen and the hypotheses are posed in such a way that our result can be made comparable to those of similar studies conducted for the U.S. and Japan by Caves and Barton (1990) and Uekusa and Torii (1987), respectively. It is interesting to observe a certain degree of similarity as well as differentiation between the cross-section evidence on Korea's manufacturing industries and that on the U.S. and Japanese industries. As for the similarities, we can find positive and significant effects on technical efficiency of relative size of production and the extent of specialization in production, and negative and significant effect of the variations in capital-labor ratio within industries. The curvature influence of concentration ratio on technical efficiency is also confirmed in the Korean case. There are differences, too. We cannot find any significant effects of capital vintage, R&D and foreign competition on technical efficiency, all of which were shown to be robust determinants of technical efficiency in the U.S. case. We note, however, that the variables measuring capital vintage effect, R&D and the degree of foreign competition in Korean markets are suspected to suffer from serious measurement errors incurred in data collection and/or conversion of industrial classification system into the KSIC (Korea Standard Industrial Classification) system. Thus, we are reluctant to accept the findings on the effects of these variables as definitive conclusions on Korea's industrial organization. Another finding that interests us is that the cross-industry evidence becomes consistently strong when we use the efficiency estimates based on gross output instead of value added, which provides us with an ex post empirical criterion to choose an output measure between the two in estimating the production frontier. We also conduct exploratory analyses on the stability of the estimates of technical efficiency in Korea's manufacturing industries. Though the method of testing stability employed in this paper is never a complete one, we cannot find strong evidence that our efficiency estimates are stable over time. The outcome is both surprising and disappointing. We can also show that the instability of technical efficiency over time is partly explained by the way we constructed our measures of technical efficiency. To the extent that our efficiency estimates depend on the shape of the empirical distribution of plants in the input-output space, any movements of the production frontier over time are not reflected in the estimates, and possibilities exist of associating a higher level of technical efficiency with a downward movement of the production frontier over time, and so on. Thus, we find that efficiency measures that take into account not only the distributional changes, but also the shifts of the production frontier over time, increase the extent of stability, and are more appropriate for use in a dynamic context. The remaining portion of the instability of technical efficiency over time is not explained satisfactorily in this paper, and future research should address this question.

본 논문은 유승민(劉承旻) 이인찬(李仁燦)(1990)이 추정한 우리나라 제조업(製造業)의 기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)을 토대로 기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)의 산업적(産業的) 격차(隔差)를 설명하는 경험적 증거를 구하고 효율성 추정치의 동태적(動態的) 안정성(安定性)을 분석하였다. 분석결과 산업(産業)의 생산규모(生産規模)가 클수록, 생산특화도(生産特化度)가 높을수록, 자본(資本)-노동비율(勞動比率)의 이질성(異質性)이 낮을수록 높은 기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)을 나타내었다. 이러한 결과는 미국(美國) 일본(日本)의 경우에 대한 연구결과와 공통되는 것으로서 기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)과 산업조직특성간(産業組織特性間)의 관계가 경제규모나 발전단계의 차이에도 불구하고 가설(假說)의 일반성(一般性)을 지지한다는 점에서 중요한 의미를 지닌다. 기업집중률(企業集中率) 또한 기술적 효율성에 대하여 선형(線型)보다는 이차형(二次型)의 관계를 가지고 있으나 우리나라의 경우 기술적 효율성이 극대화되는 집중률(集中率)은 매우 높은 것으로 나타났다. 또한 본 논문은 효율성(效率性) 척도간(尺度間)의 선택문제에 대한 경험적 기준을 제시하였는데 부가가치액기준(附加價値額基準)보다는 생산액기준(生産額基準)으로 추정된 기술적(技術的) 효율성(效率性)이 제가설(諸假說)들과 잘 부합되는 결과를 나타내었다. 효율성의 동태적(動態的) 안정성(安定性)에 관한 시론적(試論的) 분석(分析)에 의하면 시간변화에 따른 효율성 추청치의 안정성은 효율성 척도간에 다소의 차이는 있으나 기대한 만큼 높지 않았다. 따라서 기술적 효율성의 동태적(動態的) 불안전요인(不安全要因)에 관한 설명은 연구과제로 남는다.

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