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What is Productivity: Capacity or Welfare Management?

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Author Info
Charles R. Hulten
Abstract

A number of recent papers have examined the role of environmental variables in accounting for economic growth, and have concluded that net measures of national product are superior to gross measures in portraying the outcome of the growth process. This paper argues that the two measures are not substitutes, but complements which reveal different aspects of economic growth: gross product is the output concept for estimating the structure of production. while net product is the correct concept for getting at the welfare consequences of economic growth. It is then shown that this capacity-welfare nexus is mirrored in the Hicksian and Harrodian definitions of technical change. An alternative to the conventional Solow growth accounting framework is presented in which the change in national wealth is decomposed into components corresponding to labor input and the Harrodian rate of technical change.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 3970.

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Date of creation: Jan 1992
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:3970

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  1. Swan, Trevor W, 2002. "Economic Growth," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 78(243), pages 375-80, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Hulten, Charles R, 1978. "Growth Accounting with Intermediate Inputs," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 45(3), pages 511-18, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Hulten, Charles R, 1973. "Divisia Index Numbers," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 41(6), pages 1017-25, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Hulten, Charles R, 1979. "On the "Importance" of Productivity Change," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 69(1), pages 126-36, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Christensen, Laurits R & Jorgenson, Dale W & Lau, Lawrence J, 1973. "Transcendental Logarithmic Production Frontiers," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 55(1), pages 28-45, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Weitzman, Martin L, 1976. "On the Welfare Significance of National Product in a Dynamic Economy," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 90(1), pages 156-62, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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