This working paper offers a synthesis of the current knowledge on the determinants of productivity. It carefully reviews both “spatial” (e.g. agglomerations, infrastructure, geography) and “aspatial” (e.g. human capital, labour regulations, industry-level innovation and dynamism)...

That global networks provide positive externalities to participating firms is a well‑documented fact. Less is known about how the performance of non-participating firms, especially those that are small or medium-sized, changes with exposure to an increase in the presence of globally integrated...

Regional inequality has increased in Sweden over the past decades, albeit from a low level. While redistribution and other public policies can narrow regional gaps in income, well-being and access to services, productivity growth is key to maintaining economic dynamism, creating job...

Higher living standards and well-being, as well as convergence with more advanced economies, will depend on achieving higher productivity, which in turn would be boosted by more investment in capital. In particular, investment in knowledge-based capital and greater inward FDI can help Slovenia...

Using a new survey, we show that the dispersion of marginal products across firms in the European Union is about twice as large as that in the United States. Reducing it to the US level would increase EU GDP by more than 30 percent. Alternatively, removing barriers between industries and...

The correlation between a firm’s size and its productivity level varies considerably across OECD countries, suggesting that some countries are more successful at channelling resources to high productivity firms than others. Accordingly, we examine the extent to which regulations affecting...

This paper explores cross-country differences in the design of insolvency regimes and their potential links with two inter-related sources of labour productivity weakness: the survival of “zombie” firms (firms that would typically exit in a competitive market) and capital misallocation. New...

This paper extends earlier OECD work exploring the link between skills mismatch, productivity and policies to include the countries in the second wave of OECD Survey of Adult Skills, with a special focus on New Zealand. We find that the percentage of workers who are mismatched in terms of skills...