Measurement of Productivity and Efficiency Theory and Practice

Methods and perspectives to model and measure productivity and efficiency have made a number of important advances in the last decade. Using the standard and innovative formulations of the theory and practice of efficiency and productivity measurement, Robin C. Sickles and Valentin Zelenyuk provide a comprehensive approach to productivity and efficiency analysis, covering its theoretical underpinnings and its empirical implementation, paying particular attention to the implications of neoclassical economic theory. A distinct feature of the book is that it presents a wide array of theoretical and empirical methods utilized by researchers and practitioners who study productivity issues. An accompanying website includes methods, programming codes that can be used with widely available software like MATLAB® and R, and test data for many of the productivity and efficiency estimators discussed in the book. It will be valuable to upper-level undergraduates, graduate students, and professionals.

Preface; Introduction; 1. Production theory: primal approach; 2. Production theory: dual approach; 3. Efficiency measurement; 4. Productivity indexes: part 1; 5. Aggregation; 6. Functional forms; 7. Productivity indexes: part 2; 8. Envelopment-type estimators; 9. Statistical analysis for DEA and FDH: Part 1; 10. Statistical analysis for DEA and FDH: part 2; 11. Cross-sectional stochastic frontiers; 12. SF models-first generation panel approaches; 13. SF models-second generation approaches; 14. Endogeneity; 15. Dynamic models; 16. Shape restrictions and model averaging; 17. Measurement, KLEMS, and other data; Afterword.

This book provides a comprehensive approach to productivity and efficiency analysis for upper-level undergraduates, graduate students, and professionals. An accompanying website includes programming codes that can be used with widely available software like MATLAB® and R, and test data for many of the estimators in the book.

Robin C. Sickles is the Reginald Henry Hargrove Professor of Economics and Professor of Statistics at Rice University, Houston. He served as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Productivity Analysis as well as an Associate Editor for a number of other economics and econometrics journals. He is currently an Associate Editor of the Journal of Econometrics.
Valentin Zelenyuk is the Australian Research Council Future Fellow at the School of Economics at the University of Queensland, where he served as Research Director and Director of the Centre for Efficiency and Productivity Analysis. He is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Productivity Analysis and the Data Envelopment Analysis Journal.