Provision Of Services In Poland: A Theoretical And Statistical Study

Problems raised in the article relate to the treatment of services in a planned economy. While the theoretical discussion argues for change in the conceptual framework for qualifying and measuring the output of the service sector, the practice of statistical reporting is still based on the classical concept of the material product system (MPS) of national accounts. The first part of the article gives an outline of the MPS background and presents major theoretical and practical dilemmas of measurement of services in the non‐material sphere of production. The second part is an empirical investigation of interrelatedness between production in the material sphere and services created in the non‐material sphere in Poland during the period 1970–81. Correlation and elasticity of growth analysis as well as structural forecasting methods were used in order to demonstrate the strong relation between the development of the material and non‐material spheres of production, and the favorable position of services in terms of factor productivities with their low potential for dynamic structural changes in the future. For the purpose of empirical analysis, the service sector output was estimated by using an extended version of MPS. There are two major conclusions to be drawn from the analysis. The first is that the classical concept of MPS not only inadequately copes with changes resulting from economic reforms in Poland but produces more and more dilemmas and practical problems. The second conclusion calls for a more active approach to services in development programming and planning.