We compute rates of growth in labor productivity during the 1973-80 period for samples of individual manufacturing firms, in both Japan and the U.S., and relate them to differences in the rates of growth in their capital-labor ratios and in their intensities of R&D effort. Japanese firms spent...

Some aspects of the econometric estimation of production functions are discussed, focussing primarily on the issue of simultaneity and reviewing the stream of criticisms of Douglas' work and the response to it. We look in particular at the work that uses panel data on micro data for plants or...

We estimate separate productions functions for approximately 450 manufacturing firms each in France and the United States and for 850 manufacturing firms in Japan, covering the 13 year period 1967-1979, and focus on the wide dispersion in the estimated slope coefficients in all three countries....

This paper compares and analyzes the growth of productivity in the manufacturing industries and firms in France and the U.S. based on newly assembled comparable data sets in both countries. Three explanations of the recent productivity slowdown are reviewed: shortfall in physical investment,...