CAREER: A Micro to Macro Analysis of Productivity and Growth

这项拨款的目的是为一项研究提供资金，该研究将分析为什么不同国家、不同公司、不同时间的生产率和增长率差异如此之大。该提案将运用实证和模拟分析来试图理解这些差异的原因，特别关注三个关键因素：首先，通过减少招聘、投资和提高生产率的再分配，关注不确定性增加在推动衰退方面的潜在作用。这种观点认为，经济衰退期间不确定性的增加将使企业对招聘和投资持谨慎态度，从而削减总劳动力和资本存量。然而，这也会减少企业间生产要素的再配置，因为生产性企业在扩张时会更加谨慎，而非生产性企业在收缩时会更加谨慎。由于要素的再分配似乎推动了大部分的总生产率增长，不确定性可能在推动商业周期方面发挥重要作用。第二部分将着眼于解释不同公司和国家管理实践的差异。商界人士、政策制定者和媒体长期以来一直声称，管理实践在塑造企业生产力方面发挥着关键作用。但由于缺乏良好的管理数据，经验主义经济学家相对来说没什么可说的。该提案将使用一种新的双盲调查工具来帮助建立一个关于管理实践的系统证据基础，并利用它来调查哪些因素和政策有助于解释不同公司和国家之间的管理差异。第三部分将探讨发展中国家通过创新和信息技术投资增加贸易竞争对推动生产率增长的作用。尤其是中国出口的增长，引发了有关其对就业和经济增长影响的激烈辩论。许多评论家还将此与工资不平等的迅速加剧联系起来。但由于缺乏国际上可比较的微观数据，这些影响难以评估。该提案将建立一个新的美国和欧洲就业、创新和信息技术数据库，以帮助评估来自中国和其他发展中国家的进口竞争的影响。更广泛的影响：拟议研究的许多潜在重要的更广泛的影响中有三个如下。首先，这项工作有可能在企业一级确定可以显著提高生产率的具体干预措施，特别是在发展中国家。其次，拟议的研究将创建重要的新数据库，可能对学者和政策制定者都有价值。第三，该提案提出了一个令人信服的理由，即拟议的研究将对教学和指导产生异常大的溢出效应。

The aim of this grant is to provide fundng for a proposal that analyzes why productivity and growth vary so spectacularly across countries, firms and time. The proposal will apply empirical and simulation analysis to try to understand the causes of these differences, focusing in particular on three key factors:The first looks at the potential role of increased uncertainty in driving recessions by reducing hiring, investment and productivity-enhancing reallocation. The idea is that the rise in uncertainty during recessions will make firms cautious about hiring and investment, cutting the aggregate labor force and capital stock. However this will also reduce the reallocation of factors of production across firms, since productive firms will be more cautious about expanding and unproductive firms more cautious about contracting. Since the reallocation of factors appears to drive the majority of aggregate productivity growth, uncertainty could play a large role in driving business cycles. The second will look at explaining variations in management practices across firms and countries. Business people, policymakers and the media have long claimed that management practices play a key role in shaping firm productivity. But empirical economists have had relatively little to say because of the absence of good management data. The proposal will use a new double-blind survey tool to help to build a systematic evidence base on management practices, and use this to investigate which factors and policies help explain variations in management across firms and countries. The third will look at the role of increasing trade competition from developing countries in driving productivity growth through innovation and IT investment. The rise of Chinese exports in particular has been generating intense debate over its impact on employment and growth. Many commentators have also linked this to the rapid increase in wage-inequality. But these effects are difficult to evaluate because of the lack of internationally comparable micro-data. This proposal will build a new US and European database on employment, innovation and IT to help evaluate the impact of import competition from China and other developing countries.Broader Impacts: Three of the many potentially important broader impacts of the proposed research are the following. First, the work has the potential to identify concrete interventions at the firm level that could significantly increase productivity, particularly in developing countries. Second, the proposed research will create important new databases that are likely to be valuable to both scholars and policymakers. Third, the proposal makes a compelling case that the proposed research will have unusually large spillovers to teaching and mentorship.