Asian and western economists apply a variety of empirical techniques to measure productivity growth, factor accumulation, and economic efficiency at both large and small scales in the region as a whole and in specific countries over the past three decades. Their techniques include traditional growth accounting, econometric frontier estimation, and data envelopment analysis. Among the issues they discuss are the influential role of trade in the region, macroeconomic management, income, capital, labor productivity, technology, and investment. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Productivity growth is a keyword for sustainable economic growth in a knowledge-based society. There has been significant methodological development in the literature on productivity and efficiency analysis, e.g. SFA (Stochastic Frontier Analysis) and DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis). All these methodological developments should be matched with applications in order to provide practical implications for private and public decision-makers. This volume provides a collection of up-to-date and new applications of productivity and efficiency analysis. In particular, the case studies cover various economic issues in the Asia-Pacific region. The authors analyze the performance of manufacturing firms, banks, venture capital, broadcasting firms, as well as the issues of efficiency in the education sector, regional development, and defense industry. These case studies will shed light on the potential contribution of productivity and efficiency analysis to the enhancement of economic performance.

'. . . this voluminous book is well put together and clearly worth a read.' - Renuka Mahadevan, ASEAN Bulletin Following on from their previous book Economic Efficiency and Productivity Growth in the Asia-Pacific Region, the authors in this volume analyse the economic performance of many of the major economies in the Asia-Pacific region including Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Korea, Indonesia, Hong Kong, China and Japan. They examine economic and productivity growth, competitiveness and efficiency developments in the region. An introductory essay by the editors surveys recent economic developments in the region whilst introducing and cohesively integrating the chapters that follow. The studies employ a variety of modern analytical constructs and empirical techniques of open economy growth accounting as well as the measurement of productivity change, technical change and economic efficiency. A number of the chapters examine the entire region while others focus exclusively on a nation or industry. Several chapters study the causes and consequences of the financial crises in the region in 1997 from a recent historical perspective.

This book seeks to account for what James H. Gapinski calls the "miraculous" growth of Asian economies. He examines several major determinants of growth, including capital quantity (gross investment and physical depreciation), capital quality (embodied technical progress), labour quantity (employment), labour quality (education), international trade (exports and openness), and total factor productivity (growth not accounted for by capital and labour quantity). The book begins by providing an orientation to the region, discussing basic conditions and historical events. Part II gives the theory, facts, and explanation of growth, a main issue being productivity convergence. The author's analysis of growth determinants provides a natural framework from which to examine major issues that bear on Asian Pacific growth in the future, so the third part examines Hong Kong's growth under reversion to China and inquires into the growth consequences of the Asian currency crisis. Along the way, Gapinski examines implications for business and policy leaders of the current growth trends.

"Suggests processes and strategies for choosing the best technique to draw up policies for sustainable growth." - dust jacket.

Considering the examples of Australia and the Pacific Rim, Growth and Productivity in East Asia offers a contemporary explanation for national productivity that measures contributions not only from capital and labor, but also from economic activities and relevant changes in policy, education, and technology. Takatoshi Ito and Andrew K. Rose have organized a group of collaborators from several Asian countries, the United States, and other parts of the globe who ably balance both macroeconomic and microeconomic study with theoretical and empirical approaches. Growth and Productivity in East Asia gives special attention to the causes for the unusual success of Australia, one of the few nations to maintain unprecedented economic growth despite the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the 2001 global downturn. A new database comprising eighty-four Japanese sectors reveals new findings for the last thirty years of sectoral productivity and growth in Japan. Studies focusing on Indonesia, Taiwan, and Korea also consider productivity and its relationship to research and development, foreign ownership, and policy reform in such industries as manufacturing, automobile production, and information technology.