The most direct mechanism by which labour productivity affects living standards is through real wages, that is, wages adjusted to reflect the cost of living. Between 1980 and 2005, the median real earnings of Canadians workers stagnated, while labour productivity rose 37 per cent. This article...

The author reviews the book Information Technology and the American Growth Resurgence by Dale Jorgenson, Mun Ho, and Kevin Stiroh, which provides a detailed analysis of the remarkable rebound in productivity and output growth in the last decade. He notes that the book can be considered a...

Interprovincial migration has increased significantly in Canada since 2003. This article develops a methodology to estimate total output gains due to interprovincial migration from two sources: gains due to increased employment, and gains due to re-allocation of workers between provinces with...

In the third and final article in the Symposium included in this volume on Future Productivity Growth in Canada, Benoît Robidoux from Finance Canada observes that there has been a structural improvement in labour productivity growth in Canada since 1996 and that it is likely that this stronger...

Trend productivity growth is a crucial determinant of future living standards as well as fiscal balances. In this article, Benoit Robidoux and Bing-Sun Wong from Finance Canada examine the issue of whether trend productivity growth has increased in Canada and conclude that in fact it has. If...

This twelth issue of the International Productivity Monitor, published by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards, differs from past issues. Five of the six articles address one topic, namely the impact of the Boskin Commission after one decade on price measurement. A final article...

The author summarizes the report’s methods, findings, and recommendations, and then reviews the comments and criticisms that appeared soon after the report was issued. Changes in CPI methodology are also summarized and assessed, as is recent research on related issues. Based on recent...

This eighth issue of the International Productivity Monitor produced by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards contains eight articles. Topics covered are: a progress report on endogenous growth theory; recent productivity developments in Canada and the United States; monetary policy in...

In this article, Someshwar Rao, Jiamin Tang and Weimin Wang of Industry Canada examine the impact of capital accumulation on Canada's recent productivity record. A key finding is that the widening of the Canada-U.S. labour productivity gap in both the business sector and in manufacturing in the...

Since 1995, productivity growth has accelerated significantly in the United States. Information technology has always been thought to be the driving force behind this development. In this article by Kevin Stiroh of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York provides strong empirical support for this...