Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth

Zsofia Barany () and Christian Siegel

VfS Annual Conference 2019 (Leipzig): 30 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall - Democracy and Market Economy from Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association

Abstract: We study the origins of labor productivity growth and its differences across sectors. In our model, sectors employ workers of different occupations and various forms of capital, none of which are perfect substitutes, and technology evolves at the sector-factor cell level. Using the model we infer technologies from US data over 1960-2017. We find sector-specific routine labor augmenting technological change to be crucial. It is the most important driver of sectoral differences, and has a large and increasing contribution to aggregate labor productivity growth. Neither capital accumulation nor the occupational employment structure within sectors explains much of the sectoral differences.

Keywords: biased technological change; structural transformation; labor productivity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J24 O33 O41 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Engines of sectoral labor productivity growth (2021)
Working Paper: Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth (2021)
Working Paper: Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth (2021)
Working Paper: Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth (2019)
Working Paper: Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth (2019)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:zbw:vfsc19:203596

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