The intent of this study was to survey opinions of
producine managers and industrial engineers concerning
several aspects of productivity. The survey was conducted
by means of a questionnaire. The number of questionnaires
administered was 540. Useful responses were 145 (27%).
In addition to English, there were versions of the...
A unique team productivity raining program was developed and
implemented for Electro-Scientific Industries, Inc. (ESI). This program
was designed to train shop floor workers in teamwork skills and traditional
industrial engineering techniques. In this way, problem-solving
tools are available to the hourly manufacturing worker for use
in improving communications, quality,...
Interfirm comparisons are used internationally to provide productivity
measurement systems. These systems indicate changes in productivity.
The development of interfirm comparisons in Britain,
Australia, and Canada is discussed. Interfirm comparisons have also
been conducted in the United States under the auspices of various
trade associations. However, in the United States...
A firm's productivity is composed of two parts: pure technical change and location-specific (agglomeration) externalities. Regional productivity is thus an aggregation of productivity of firms producing similar goods and located in a given region. International trade can affect both components of regional productivity. First, trade openness in a closed economy...
The objective of this dissertation is to examine multi-product firms' productivity and export behavior. More specifically, this dissertation estimates productivity of firms that produce and sell multiple products, and the role of productivity in such firms' export behavior. In doing so, this dissertation develops a firm-level gravity approach to test...
In this work I integrate some of my recent research developments in the theory and practice of Productivity and Efficiency Analysis of Economic Systems. In particular, I present some new theoretical relationships between various measures of efficiency and productivity, propose new solutions to some aggregation problems in efficiency analysis and...
Based on the premise that interfirm comparison can be an effective
productivity improvement tool, productivity interfirm comparison (PIC)
methods are examined in this research. The first part is an extensive
literature review regarding the conventional interfirm comparison (IFC)
scheme accepted widely in many countries outside the United States.
Then, the...
This dissertation’s three essays investigate trade and productivity effects on firm behavior based on new heterogeneous-firms trade models in the case of Korea. In the first essay, firms’ decision to export in the case of Korean manufacturing industries is examined, where the change in firms’ productivity before and after exports...
The objective of this dissertation is to theoretically and empirically examine the role of firm heterogeneity in terms of productivity and skill-intensity in the agglomeration process and the effect of agglomeration on regional economic development.
In the first essay, I analyze the effect of trade liberalization on agglomeration of high-...
Productivity Interfirm Comparison (PIC) is a simple
method used to improve productivity at the firm level,
where a number of firms operate in the same product line so
that performance information on the firms can be compiled
and compared. This results in identifying potential areas
for improvement or exploitation. The...
This study focuses on the development of new, non-parametric efficiency measures based on the idea of aggregation via merging functions. We use Shephard's (1970) axiomatic approach of distance functions as the basis for theoretical methodology. In particular, this approach is a background for non-parametric efficiency measures defined on a linearly...
Over the years, the performance of construction projects has been a main source of concern given the percentage of a project cost associated with poor project performance. As a result of the growing clamor to improve the output of the built industry, comprehensive studies have been conducted to examine the...
Firms' participation in exporting or foreign direct investment is an extremely rare behavior: only 4 percent of over 5.5 million U.S. firms were exporters in 2000. Exporters are generally larger (e.g. output and employment) and more productive than firms serving only domestic markets. Such heterogeneity within a narrowly defined industry...
The Northwest forest products industry has been under severe economic pressure for the past several years. Many Northwest forest products companies have gone out of business entirely and others have closed portions of their operations. This monograph describes how one company has instituted a productivity improvement program to reduce its...