IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/mtu/wpaper/24_06.html

Still medalling: Productivity gets a bronze (data source)

Author

Listed:
  • Fabling Richard

    (Motu Economic and Public Policy Research)

Abstract

Productivity data is missing from the Longitudinal Business Database (LBD) for over a third of firm-year observations in "measured sector" industries, equating to a fifth of total labour in those industries. We develop a method to fill these data gaps using an additional (third) data source - firm-level annualised goods and services tax (GST) returns. Coupled with additional modelling using full-coverage employment information, the resulting "complete" productivity dataset provides additional avenues for researchers to test the robustness of their results to the inclusion of firm types previously underrepresented in the productivity data - particularly new and owner-operated firms.

Suggested Citation

  • Fabling Richard, 2024. "Still medalling: Productivity gets a bronze (data source)," Motu Working Papers 24_06, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:mtu:wpaper:24_06
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://motu-www.motu.org.nz/wpapers/24_06.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David C. Maré & Dean R. Hyslop & Richard Fabling, 2017. "Firm productivity growth and skill," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(3), pages 302-326, September.
    2. Allan, Corey & Maré, David C., 2022. "Who Benefits from Firm Success? Heterogenous Rent Sharing in New Zealand," IZA Discussion Papers 15264, IZA Network @ LISER.
    3. Chad Syverson, 2011. "What Determines Productivity?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(2), pages 326-365, June.
    4. Arthur Grimes & Cleo Ren & Philip Stevens, 2012. "The need for speed: impacts of internet connectivity on firm productivity," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 37(2), pages 187-201, April.
    5. Eric J. Bartelsman & Zoltan Wolf, 2014. "Forecasting Aggregate Productivity Using Information from Firm-Level Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(4), pages 745-755, October.
    6. Isabelle Sin & Steven Stillman & Richard Fabling, 2022. "What Drives the Gender Wage Gap? Examining the Roles of Sorting, Productivity Differences, Bargaining, and Discrimination," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(4), pages 636-651, October.
    7. Michael Kirker & Lynda Sanderson, 2022. "Firm Productivity Growth and the Knowledge of New Workers," Treasury Working Paper Series 22/01, New Zealand Treasury.
    8. Corey Allan & David C. Maré, 2021. "Do workers share in firm success? Pass-through estimates for New Zealand," Motu Working Papers 21_15, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    9. Chiara Criscuolo & Alexander Hijzen & Cyrille Schwellnus & Erling Barth & Wen-Hao Chen & Richard Fabling & Priscilla Fialho & Balazs Stadler & Richard Upward & Wouter Zwysen & Katarzyna Grabska-Romago, 2020. "Workforce composition, productivity and pay: the role of firms in wage inequality," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 1603, OECD Publishing.
    10. Lisa Meehan, 2020. "Productivity in New Zealand: the role of resource allocation among firms," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 54(1), pages 39-66, January.
    11. Richard Fabling & Lynda Sanderson, 2016. "A Rough Guide to New Zealand's Longitudinal Business Database (2nd edition)," Motu Working Papers 16_03, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    12. David Christopher Maré & Richard Fabling, 2013. "Productivity and Local Workforce Composition," Advances in Spatial Science, in: Riccardo Crescenzi & Marco Percoco (ed.), Geography, Institutions and Regional Economic Performance, edition 127, pages 59-76, Springer.
    13. Fabling, Richard & Grimes, Arthur, 2021. "Picking up speed: Does ultrafast broadband increase firm productivity?," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    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. Richard Fabling, 2026. "Auckland firm performance in Covid-19 lockdown," Motu Working Papers 26_03, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.

    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. Richard Fabling, 2021. "Living on the edge: An anatomy of New Zealand's most productive firms," Motu Working Papers 21_01, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    2. Allan, Corey & Maré, David C. & Hyslop, Dean R., 2025. "Monopsony in the New Zealand Labour Market: First Estimates from Administrative Data," IZA Discussion Papers 17614, IZA Network @ LISER.
    3. David C. Maré & Dean R. Hyslop & Richard Fabling, 2017. "Firm productivity growth and skill," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(3), pages 302-326, September.
    4. Richard Fabling & David C Maré & Philip Stevens, 2022. "Migration and firm-level productivity," Working Papers 2022/01, New Zealand Productivity Commission.
    5. Richard Fabling & Arthur Grimes, 2019. "Ultra-fast broadband, skill complementarities, gender and wages," Motu Working Papers 19_23, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    6. Fabling, Richard & Grimes, Arthur, 2021. "Picking up speed: Does ultrafast broadband increase firm productivity?," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 57(C).
    7. Anwar Adem & Richard Kneller & Cher Li, 2023. "Information constraints and technology efficiency: Field experiments benchmarking firms website performance," Discussion Papers 2023-07, University of Nottingham, GEP.
    8. Fabling, Richard & Mare, David C, 2015. "Production function estimation using New Zealand’s Longitudinal Business Database," Motu Working Papers 290585, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    9. Lynda Sanderson & Garrick Wright-McNaughton & Naomitsu Yashiro, 2022. "Does high-speed internet boost exporting?," Working Papers 2022/02, New Zealand Productivity Commission.
    10. Anil Rupasingha & John Pender & Ryan Williams, 2024. "Broadband and rural development: Impacts of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Broadband Initiatives Program on saving and creating jobs," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 62(2), pages 698-721, April.
    11. Chu Ping Lo, 2024. "Digitalization, AI Intensity, and International Trade," Annals of Economics and Finance, Society for AEF, vol. 25(1), pages 251-273, May.
    12. Cambini, Carlo & Grinza, Elena & Sabatino, Lorien, 2023. "Ultra-fast broadband access and productivity: Evidence from Italian firms," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    13. Kausik Chaudhuri & S. N Rajesh Raj & Subash Sasidharan, 2018. "Broadband Adoption and Firm Performance: Evidence from Informal Sector Firms in India," Working Papers id:12744, eSocialSciences.
    14. Eric J. Bartelsman & Martin Falk & Eva Hagsten & Michael Polder, 2019. "Productivity, technological innovations and broadband connectivity: firm-level evidence for ten European countries," Eurasian Business Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 9(1), pages 25-48, March.
    15. Haller, Stefanie A. & Lyons, Sean, 2019. "Effects of broadband availability on total factor productivity in service sector firms: Evidence from Ireland," Telecommunications Policy, Elsevier, vol. 43(1), pages 11-22.
    16. Fabling, Richard & Mare, David C., 2019. "Improved productivity measurement in New Zealand's Longitudinal Business Database," Motu Working Papers 290393, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    17. Timothy De Stefano & Richard Kneller & Jonathan Timmis, 2014. "The (Fuzzy) Digital Divide: The Effect of Broadband Internet Use on UK Firm Performance," Discussion Papers 14/06, University of Nottingham, School of Economics.
    18. Rho, Yeirae & Fabrizi, Simona & Lippert, Steffen, 2021. "Employee characteristics, absorptive capacity and innovation," MPRA Paper 106407, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 04 Mar 2021.
    19. Emilio Colombo & Luca Michele Portoghese & Patrizio Tirelli, 2025. "Broadband Shocks, TFP Growth and Polarisation of European Firms," DISEIS - Quaderni del Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo dis2504, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimento di Economia internazionale, delle istituzioni e dello sviluppo (DISEIS).
    20. Guanyu Zheng, 2016. "Geographic proximity and productivity convergence across New Zealand firms," Working Papers 2016/04, New Zealand Productivity Commission.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D20 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - General
    • D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Cost; Capital; Capital, Total Factor, and Multifactor Productivity; Capacity

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:mtu:wpaper:24_06. 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: Emma Williams (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/motuenz.html .

    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.