• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.3-53
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• 2003

Using the plant level panel data on Korean manufacturing during 1990-98 period, this study tries to assess the role of entry and exit in enhancing aggregate productivity, both qualitatively and quantitatively. Main findings of this study are summarized as follows. First, plant entry and exit rates in Korean manufacturing seem quite high: they are higher than in the U.S. or several developing countries for which comparable studies exist. Second, in line with existing studies on other countries, plant turnovers reflect underlying productivity differential in Korean manufacturing, with the "shadow of death" effect as well as selection and learning effects all present. Third, plant entry and exit account for as much as 45 and 65 percent in manufacturing productivity growth during cyclical upturn and downturn, respectively. The findings of this study show that the entry and exit of plants has been an important source of productivity growth in Korean manufacturing. Plant birth and death are mainly a process of resource reallocation from plants with relatively low and declining productivity to a group of heterogeneous plants, some of which have the potential to become highly efficient in future. The most obvious lesson from this study is that it is important to establish policy or institutional environment where efficient businesses can succeed and inefficient businesses fail.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.343-363
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• 2015

This study is to analyze the effects of climate change on national total factor productivity. Changes in temperature and rainfalls which are the representative climate variables are used as main factors to measure climate change. Not only average values of the variables but those highest values are used as independent variables in the model, in order to consider the characteristic pattern of recent climate change, the high volatilities. The OLS results are corresponding to previous literature that average temperature has a negative relationship with productivities while average rainfalls have a positive relationship. However, the results of panel analysis contradict the argument of the negative relationship between average temperature and productivities since human beings can adapt the climate change. Therefore adaptation capacity is important to forecast the effects of climate changes on economies.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.147-165
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• 2016

We empirically examine the validity of second generation endogenous growth theory suing 21 OECD countries' panel data(1981~2011). Due to non-stationarity in all variables, we test the cointegrated relationships strongly supporting the semi-endogenous growth model. In the estimation of total factor productivity growth function, the growth of domestic and foreign R&D investment levels statistically significantly affect total factor productivity growth. R&D intensity, however, has significant impacts on the total factor productivity growth only in a few models, and international technology gap also has positive impacts on GDP growth. Thus the semi-endogenous growth model is relatively supported while fully endogenous growth model is weakly and occasionally supported in OECD countries. The policy implication of supporting the semi-endogenous growth model is that the sustaining growth requires increasing R&D expenditures.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.99-123
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• 2008

In this paper, technology gap between Korea's manufacturing industries compared to technology frontier countries was estimated in order to take into account Korea's status as a technology follower country. Then by using this measure the role of technology gap was investigated in explaining total factor productivity growth of the Korean manufacturing at industry level. The main empirical findings are as follows: First, the conventional factors that were emphasized in the previous literature such as R&D intensity, trade openness and human capital play important role in explaining the growth rate of Korea's total factor productivity. Second, the larger the technology gap between Korea and technology leader country (and the faster the technology growth rate in the leader country), the higher the growth rate of total factor productivity in Korea as well. Third when the technology gap is large, the most efficient way of absorbing higher technology from frontier country seems to be the international trade channel rather than R&D or human capital accumulation.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.16 no.9
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• pp.5897-5905
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• 2015

This paper investigates the differentials in productivity and growth performance between small and medium size and large size firms in Korean manufacturing industries. According to the empirical analysis based on the Mining and Manufacturing Survey of Statistics Korea, this paper finds the following facts. First, the level of contribution of capital deepening on the growth rate of output(value added) is relatively greater in the small and medium size firm group, while the level of contribution of total factor productivity on the growth rate is relatively greater in the large size firm group. Second, the productivity polarization among the firms has increased relatively greater in the large size firm group over the past decade.

• Journal of Korea Society of Industrial Information Systems
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.76-86
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• 2008

This paper estimates the TFP in IT manufacturing (total factor productivity) by employment size of establishment and analyses the determinants of it. And the panel data is consisted of time series and cross section data of 4 employment size of establishment over $1990{\sim}2004$. During the period from 1991 to 1997 TFP increased positively irrespective of the employment size of establishment, but from 1998 to 2004 TFP increase rate turned negative except large size(more than 300) of establishment. TFP assume macro variables and policy variables as the determinants of IT manufacturing TFP. The analysis of whole size of establishment shows that sales growth rate is significantly positive, which makes us conclude that there is a teaming by doing effect and economy of scale. But some variables(i.e. IT capital stock, policy financing, and openness etc.) are significant in only a few models. So there may be different effect by employment size of establishment. In TFP determinants analysis by employment size of establishment, we find that coefficients of policy financing and openness variables are significantly positive. The larger employment size of establishment is, the larger scale economy is. And for large size(more than 300) establishment, IT capital stock helps propel the increase of the productivity.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.667-688
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• 2014

This research tested the EKC (Environment Kuznets Curve) Hypothesis using the $CO_2$ Emissions by region and GRDP. We built the panel data set on the 15 local government region from 1990 to 2010 for this analysis. GRDP, population and total factor productivity was considered as the factors influencing on the regional $CO_2$ Emissions. Analysis method in this research is panel GLS model as Lantz and Feng (2006). The results show that the EKC hypothesis did not hold in Korea but there is inverted U relationship between the $CO_2$ Emissions and total factor productivity. As the total factor productivity grows, the $CO_2$ increased but decreased after a certain level.

• Journal of Technology Innovation
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.63-100
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• 2020

This study analyzes the effectiveness of government supported R&D program for SMEs by measuring TFP improvements. We estimate TFP for Korean companies from 2011 to 2018 using Levinsohn and Petrin (2003) method which reduces endogenous problem. Then government R&D beneficiary companies were extracted from the NTIS and linked to TFP estimates. The empirical results are as follows. First, as a result of estimating production function, the contribution of TFP to value-added is more important than in the past. Second, the TFP gap between large firms and SMEs continues to wide and there is no sign of easing.(from 3.72 times in 2011 to 5.23 times in 2018). Third, SMEs beneficiaries show higher TFP level than non-beneficiaries. However their TFP was on the decline until government support. After government supported R&D program, it reverses upward. Fourth, although one-year TFP improvement of beneficiaries is bigger than non-beneficiaries, it is smaller than the control group through PSME. Because SMEs participating in government R&D programs had showed downward trend of TFP until R&D program, it is necessary to examine whether there is a fundamental discordance between the demand of SMEs for R&D program and governments policy goal. More sophisticated program design will be required to escape the recognition that government R&D programs for SMEs are just charity.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.239-261
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• 2011

The cyclicality of productivity has been one of the essential issues in macroeconomics. Since Solow(1957) developed the dominant approach to the measurement of productivity growth, Solow's approach, which assumes the perfect competition, the constant returns to scale, and the full use of input factor has been modified particularly in Hall's(1990) and Basu's(1996) works. Their researches take account of market power, returns to scale, and variable factor utilization. This paper establishes the empirical model based on Hall's(1990) and Basu's(1996) models, estimates 4 types of Solow's reidual in manufacturing and 2 service industries over the period 1975:1-2010:4, and analyzes the cyclicality of measured productivity. The result proved the measured productivity to be procyclical in manufacturing industries and electricity and water industry, and in contrast to the Basu's, the variable factor utilization transformed the countercyclicality of measured productivity into its procyclicality in the Korean economy.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.195-217
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• 2020

The improvement of energy intensity is drawing attention as a way to achieve sustainable development. Energy price and technology level are the main factors affecting energy intensity, and empirical studies on the relationship between the variables have been conducted mainly in overseas countries. However, analyzing the relation between energy intensity, energy price and technology has not been studied in Korea. Therefore, this study analyzed the dynamic relationship between energy intensity, energy price, and total factor productivity (TFP) in Korea. As a result of the analysis, the three variables form a long-term equilibrium relationship. The increase in TFP reduces energy intensity in both short and long term, and the long-term effect is greater than short-term effect. On the other hand, energy price do not have a significant impact on energy intensity. Granger causality test results show that energy intensity and TFP granger cause each other, but energy price is weak-exogenous.