IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/ijecbs/v19y2012i2p285-314.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Shrinking Hand: Why Information Technology Leads to Smaller Firms

Author

Listed:
  • Jean-Jacques Rosa
  • Julien Hanoteau

Abstract

We explain the firm downsizing trend of the recent decades by the new abundance of information -- the ICT revolution. Production processes differ in their information requirements: while decentralized production by means of market exchanges is information intensive, less information per unit of output is needed in the hierarchically integrated production of firms, and the information/output ratio is decreasing firm size. We formulate a quantity of information theory of the firm embodying these differences and derive a Coase--Rybczinski effect for the aggregate economy, which predicts a decreasing employment share of large firms and an increasing share of small ones when the aggregate quantity of information increases Panel data regressions and other evidence provide support for this hypothesis.

Suggested Citation

  • Jean-Jacques Rosa & Julien Hanoteau, 2012. "The Shrinking Hand: Why Information Technology Leads to Smaller Firms," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(2), pages 285-314, July.
  • Handle: RePEc:taf:ijecbs:v:19:y:2012:i:2:p:285-314
    DOI: 10.1080/13571516.2012.684931
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13571516.2012.684931
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/13571516.2012.684931?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Andrews,Donald W. K. & Stock,James H. (ed.), 2005. "Identification and Inference for Econometric Models," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521844413, September.
    2. John R Baldwin & Ron S Jarmin & Jianmin Tang, 2002. "The Trend to Smaller Producers in Manufacturing in Canada and the U.S," Working Papers 02-06, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    3. Krishna B. Kumar & Raghuram G. Rajan & Luigi Zingales, "undated". "What Determines Firm Size?," CRSP working papers 496, Center for Research in Security Prices, Graduate School of Business, University of Chicago.
    4. Lichtenberg, Frank R., 1992. "Industrial de-diversification and its consequences for productivity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 18(3), pages 427-438, August.
    5. Jovanovic, Boyan & Rousseau, Peter L., 2005. "General Purpose Technologies," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 18, pages 1181-1224, Elsevier.
    6. Naomi R. Lamoreaux & Daniel M.G. Raff & Peter Temin, 2002. "Beyond Markets and Hierarchies: Toward a New Synthesis of American Business History," NBER Working Papers 9029, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Chandler, Alfred D., 1990. "Scale and Scope: A Review Colloquium - Scale and Scope: The Dynamics of Industrial Capitalism. By Alfred D. ChandlerJr., with Takashi Hikino · Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990. xix + 8," Business History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 64(4), pages 690-735, January.
    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. Julien Hanoteau & Jean‐Jacques Rosa, 2019. "Information technologies and entrepreneurship," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 40(2), pages 200-212, March.
    2. Hannah Bensussan, 2023. "Understanding the paradox of control and freedom of consumption under digital capitalism with Stafford Beer's cybernetic theory," CEPN Working Papers hal-04050331, HAL.
    3. Martin Campbell-Kelly & Daniel D. Garcia-Swartz & Dhiren Patki, 2012. "Information Technology and Establishment Size in America: Rybczynski Redivivus☆," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 19(2), pages 337-357, July.

    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. Luigi Zingales & Raghuram G. Rajan, 2003. "Banks and Markets: The Changing Character of European Finance," NBER Working Papers 9595, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. D.B. Audretsch & A.R. Thurik, 2010. "Unraveling the Shift to the Entrepreneurial Economy," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 10-080/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 02 Apr 2011.
    3. Chun, Hyunbae & Kim, Jung-Wook & Morck, Randall & Yeung, Bernard, 2008. "Creative destruction and firm-specific performance heterogeneity," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 109-135, July.
    4. Fernando Broner & Daragh Clancy & Aitor Erce & Alberto Martin, 2022. "Fiscal Multipliers and Foreign Holdings of Public Debt," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 89(3), pages 1155-1204.
    5. Vieira, Flávio & MacDonald, Ronald & Damasceno, Aderbal, 2012. "The role of institutions in cross-section income and panel data growth models: A deeper investigation on the weakness and proliferation of instruments," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 127-140.
    6. Dettling, Lisa J. & Kearney, Melissa S., 2014. "House prices and birth rates: The impact of the real estate market on the decision to have a baby," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 82-100.
    7. Jureviciene Daiva & Pupelyte Laura, 2013. "Forecasting of the Influence of Financial Institutions Loan Portfolio Change for the Economic Sectors of the Country," Creative and Knowledge Society, Sciendo, vol. 3(1), pages 1-16, July.
    8. Tansel, Aysit & Keskin, Halil Ibrahim, 2017. "Education Effects on Days Hospitalized and Days out of Work by Gender: Evidence from Turkey," IZA Discussion Papers 11210, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Eric Fesselmeyer & Kiat Ying Seah, 2018. "Individual Payoffs and the Effect of Homeownership on Social Capital Investment," Journal of Housing Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(1), pages 59-78, January.
    10. Robert MacCulloch & Silvia Pezzini, 2010. "The Roles of Freedom, Growth, and Religion in the Taste for Revolution," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(2), pages 329-358, May.
    11. González-Uribe, Juanita & Reyes, Santiago, 2021. "Identifying and boosting “Gazelles”: Evidence from business accelerators," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 260-287.
    12. Markus Brueckner & Daniel Lederman, 2018. "Inequality and economic growth: the role of initial income," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 341-366, September.
    13. Caroline Flammer & Michael W. Toffel & Kala Viswanathan, 2021. "Shareholder activism and firms' voluntary disclosure of climate change risks," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(10), pages 1850-1879, October.
    14. Marcela Parada-Contzen & Andrés Riquelme-Won & Felipe Vasquez-Lavin, 2013. "The value of a statistical life in Chile," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 45(3), pages 1073-1087, December.
    15. Chiquiar, Daniel & Covarrubias, Enrique & Salcedo, Alejandrina, 2016. "Labor market consequences of trade openness and competition in foreign markets," Conference papers 332760, Purdue University, Center for Global Trade Analysis, Global Trade Analysis Project.
    16. MacDonald, Peter, 2013. "Labour substitution and the scope for military outsourcing," MPRA Paper 46688, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    17. Bahar, Dany & Choudhury, Prithwiraj & Rapoport, Hillel, 2020. "Migrant inventors and the technological advantage of nations," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 49(9).
    18. Kariem Soliman, 2021. "Are Industrial Robots a new GPT? A Panel Study of Nine European Countries with Capital and Quality-adjusted Industrial Robots as Drivers of Labour Productivity Growth," EIIW Discussion paper disbei307, Universitätsbibliothek Wuppertal, University Library.
    19. Hilber, Christian A.L., 2010. "New housing supply and the dilution of social capital," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(3), pages 419-437, May.
    20. Barry Eichengreen & Arnaud Mehl & Livia Chiţu & Thorsten Beck, 2019. "Mars or Mercury? The geopolitics of international currency choice," Economic Policy, CEPR, CESifo, Sciences Po;CES;MSH, vol. 34(98), pages 315-363.

    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:taf:ijecbs:v:19:y:2012:i:2:p:285-314. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CIJB20 .

    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.