IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ejores/v197y2009i1p332-339.html

[alpha]-Returns to scale and multi-output production technologies

Author

Listed:
  • Boussemart, Jean-Philippe
  • Briec, Walter
  • Peypoch, Nicolas
  • Tavéra, Christophe

Abstract

This contribution proposes a specification of strictly increasing and decreasing returns to scale in multi-output technologies. Along this line a notion of [alpha]-returns to scale is derived from that of homogeneous multi-output technology. For a large class of technologies we establish necessary and sufficient conditions characterizing strictly increasing and strictly decreasing returns to scale to scale. Furthermore, a relationship between input, output and graph distance functions is established. These connections lead naturally to a link between the various Malmquist indexes and the Chavas-Cox productivity index. Finally, we show that these concepts can be implemented in a DEA context using a piecewise homogeneous constant elasticity substitution-transformation model due to [Färe, R., Grosskopf, S., Njinkeu, D., 1988b. On piecewise reference technologies. Management Science 34, 1507-1511].

Suggested Citation

  • Boussemart, Jean-Philippe & Briec, Walter & Peypoch, Nicolas & Tavéra, Christophe, 2009. "[alpha]-Returns to scale and multi-output production technologies," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 197(1), pages 332-339, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:197:y:2009:i:1:p:332-339
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377-2217(08)00453-0
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Romer, Paul M, 1986. "Increasing Returns and Long-run Growth," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 94(5), pages 1002-1037, October.
    2. Forsund, Finn R & Hjalmarsson, Lennart, 1979. "Generalised Farrell Measures of Efficiency: An Application to Milk Processing in Swedish Dairy Plants," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 89(354), pages 294-315, June.
    3. Baumol, William J, 1982. "Contestable Markets: An Uprising in the Theory of Industry Structure," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(1), pages 1-15, March.
    4. R. Färe & S. Grosskopf & D. Njinkeu, 1988. "Note---On Piecewise Reference Technologies," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 34(12), pages 1507-1511, December.
    5. Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Rhodes, E., 1978. "Measuring the efficiency of decision making units," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 2(6), pages 429-444, November.
    6. Chambers,Robert G., 1988. "Applied Production Analysis," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521314275, Enero-Abr.
    7. Jean-Paul Chavas & Thomas L. Cox, 1999. "A Generalized Distance Function and the Analysis of Production Efficiency," Wisconsin-Madison Agricultural and Applied Economics Staff Papers 422, Wisconsin-Madison Agricultural and Applied Economics Department.
    8. Fare, Rolf & Grosskopf, Shawna & Zaim, Osman, 2002. "Hyperbolic efficiency and return to the dollar," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 136(3), pages 671-679, February.
    9. Fuss, Melvyn & McFadden, Daniel (ed.), 1978. "Production Economics: A Dual Approach to Theory and Applications," Elsevier Monographs, Elsevier, edition 1, number 9780444850133.
    10. Jean-Paul Chavas & Thomas L. Cox, 1999. "A Generalized Distance Function and the Analysis of Production Efficiency," Southern Economic Journal, Southern Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 294-318, October.
    11. R. D. Banker & A. Charnes & W. W. Cooper, 1984. "Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(9), pages 1078-1092, September.
    12. Lau, Lawrence J., 1978. "Applications of Profit Functions," Histoy of Economic Thought Chapters, in: Fuss, Melvyn & McFadden, Daniel (ed.),Production Economics: A Dual Approach to Theory and Applications, volume 1, chapter 3, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought.
    13. Walter Briec & Kristiaan Kerstens & Philippe Venden Eeckaut, 2004. "Non-convex Technologies and Cost Functions: Definitions, Duality and Nonparametric Tests of Convexity," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 81(2), pages 155-192, February.
    14. Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Seiford, L. & Stutz, J., 1982. "A multiplicative model for efficiency analysis," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 16(5), pages 223-224.
    15. Jose Zofio & C. A. Knox Lovell, 2001. "Graph efficiency and productivity measures: an application to US agriculture," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(11), pages 1433-1442.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Walter Briec & Marc Dubois & Stéphane Mussard, 2021. "Technical efficiency in firm games with constant returns to scale and $$\alpha $$ α -returns to scale," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 304(1), pages 35-62, September.
    2. Leleu, Hervé & Moises, James & Valdmanis, Vivian, 2012. "Optimal productive size of hospital's intensive care units," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(2), pages 297-305.
    3. Yu Sheng & Shiji Zhao & Katarina Nossal & Dandan Zhang, 2015. "Productivity and farm size in Australian agriculture: reinvestigating the returns to scale," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 59(1), pages 16-38, January.
    4. Rosa, Franco & Weaver, Robert D. & Vasciaveo, Michela, 2015. "Structural Changes and Dairy Chain Efficiency in Italy," International Journal on Food System Dynamics, International Center for Management, Communication, and Research, vol. 6(3), pages 1-21, July.
    5. Kumbhakar, Subal C., 2012. "Specification and estimation of primal production models," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 217(3), pages 509-518.
    6. Miningou, Élisé Wendlassida & Vierstraete, Valérie, 2013. "Households' living situation and the efficient provision of primary education in Burkina Faso," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 910-917.
    7. Briec, Walter & Peypoch, Nicolas & Ratsimbanierana, Hermann, 2011. "Productivity growth and biased technological change in hydroelectric dams," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 853-858, September.
    8. J-P Boussemart & W Briec & H Leleu, 2009. "Linear programming solutions and distance functions under a constant returns to scale technology," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 60(1), pages 72-78, January.
    9. Pestana Barros, Carlos & Peypoch, Nicolas, 2010. "Productivity changes in Portuguese bus companies," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 295-302, September.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Walter Briec & Laurent Cavaignac & Kristiaan Kerstens, 2020. "Input Efficiency Measures: A Generalized, Encompassing Formulation," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 68(6), pages 1836-1849, November.
    2. Walter Briec & Kristiaan Kerstens & Philippe Venden Eeckaut, 2004. "Non-convex Technologies and Cost Functions: Definitions, Duality and Nonparametric Tests of Convexity," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 81(2), pages 155-192, February.
    3. Cesaroni, Giovanni & Giovannola, Daniele, 2015. "Average-cost efficiency and optimal scale sizes in non-parametric analysis," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 242(1), pages 121-133.
    4. Leleu, Hervé & Moises, James & Valdmanis, Vivian, 2012. "Optimal productive size of hospital's intensive care units," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(2), pages 297-305.
    5. Cesaroni, Giovanni, 2018. "Industry cost efficiency in data envelopment analysis," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 37-43.
    6. Juan Aparicio & Jesús T. Pastor & José L. Zofío, 2026. "Interpreting profit-related inefficiencies as Euclidean distances in the context of directional distance functions and data envelopment analysis," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 65(1), pages 1-16, March.
    7. Camanho, Ana Santos & Silva, Maria Conceicao & Piran, Fabio Sartori & Lacerda, Daniel Pacheco, 2024. "A literature review of economic efficiency assessments using Data Envelopment Analysis," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 315(1), pages 1-18.
    8. A L Johnson & L F McGinnis, 2009. "The hyperbolic-oriented efficiency measure as a remedy to infeasibility of super efficiency models," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 60(11), pages 1511-1517, November.
    9. Luis R. Murillo‐Zamorano, 2004. "Economic Efficiency and Frontier Techniques," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 18(1), pages 33-77, February.
    10. Jean-Philippe Boussemart & Walter Briec & Raluca Parvulescu & Paola Ravelojaona, 2022. "$\Lambda$-Returns to Scale and Individual Minimum Extrapolation Principle," Papers 2212.04724, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2023.
    11. Juan Aparicio & José L. Zofío, 2020. "New Definitions of Economic Cross-efficiency," International Series in Operations Research & Management Science, in: Juan Aparicio & C. A. Knox Lovell & Jesus T. Pastor & Joe Zhu (ed.), Advances in Efficiency and Productivity II, pages 11-32, Springer.
    12. Jean-Philippe Boussemart & Walter Briec & Hervé Leleu & Paola Ravelojaona, 2019. "On estimating optimal α-returns to scale," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 70(1), pages 1-11, January.
    13. Juan Aparicio & José L. Zofío & Jesús T. Pastor, 2023. "Decomposing Economic Efficiency into Technical and Allocative Components: An Essential Property," Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications, Springer, vol. 197(1), pages 98-129, April.
    14. Pham, Manh D. & Zelenyuk, Valentin, 2019. "Weak disposability in nonparametric production analysis: A new taxonomy of reference technology sets," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 274(1), pages 186-198.
    15. Barbero, Javier & Zofío, José L., 2023. "The measurement of profit, profitability, cost and revenue efficiency through data envelopment analysis: A comparison of models using BenchmarkingEconomicEfficiency.jl," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 89(C).
    16. Cesaroni, Giovanni, 2020. "Technically and cost-efficient centralized allocations in data envelopment analysis," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    17. Viera Mendelová, 2021. "Decomposition of cost efficiency with adjustable prices: an application of data envelopment analysis," Operational Research, Springer, vol. 21(4), pages 2739-2770, December.
    18. Mahmood Mehdiloo & Jafar Sadeghi & Kristiaan Kerstens, 2024. "Top Down Axiomatic Modeling of Metatechnologies and Evaluating Directional Economic Efficiency," Working Papers 2024-EQM-03, IESEG School of Management.
    19. Bruno De Borger & Kristiaan Kerstens & Diego Prior & Ignace Van de Woestyne, 2013. "Static efficiency decompositions and capacity utilization: integrating economic and technical capacity notions," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(24), pages 3529-3529, August.
    20. Kristiaan Kerstens & Ignace Van de Woestyne, 2021. "Cost functions are nonconvex in the outputs when the technology is nonconvex: convexification is not harmless," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 305(1), pages 81-106, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Cost; Capital; Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity; Capacity

    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:eee:ejores:v:197:y:2009:i:1:p:332-339. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eor .

    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.