IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/reviec/v14y2006i5p958-967.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Production Possibility Frontier as a Maximum Value Function: Concavity and Non‐increasing Returns to Scale

Author

Listed:
  • Ardeshir J. Dalal

Abstract

This paper makes both a methodological as well as a substantive contribution to the literature on the concavity of the production possibility frontier (PPF). Rather than using the standard, calculus‐based techniques, the method here relies on the fact that the PPF is a maximum value function. The consequent simplification in analysis makes it possible to demonstrate that the conditions which are sufficient to guarantee global concavity of the PPF are considerably less stringent than those stated in the literature. Existing analyses have assumed that production functions are (a) concave and homothetic, or (b) display non‐increasing returns to scale (NIRS) and homogeneity. This paper shows that concavity without homotheticity, or NIRS and quasiconcavity without homogeneity (or even homotheticity) are sufficient, thus greatly increasing the generality of existing results. The analysis can be extended to include situations in which the input set includes industry‐specific factors.

Suggested Citation

  • Ardeshir J. Dalal, 2006. "The Production Possibility Frontier as a Maximum Value Function: Concavity and Non‐increasing Returns to Scale," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(5), pages 958-967, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:reviec:v:14:y:2006:i:5:p:958-967
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-9396.2006.00610.x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9396.2006.00610.x
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/j.1467-9396.2006.00610.x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gang Li & Akihiko Yanase, 2016. "On the Production Efficiency of Full Employment under Production Externalities," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 36(4), pages 2482-2490.
    2. Li, Gang & 李, 綱, 2015. "The Production Possibility Frontier under Strong Input-generated Externalities," CCES Discussion Paper Series 57, Center for Research on Contemporary Economic Systems, Graduate School of Economics, Hitotsubashi University.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:reviec:v:14:y:2006:i:5:p:958-967. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0965-7576 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.