OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers

ISSN :
1815-199X (en ligne)
DOI :
10.1787/1815199x
Cacher / Voir l'abstract
This series is designed to make available to a wider readership selected labour market, social policy and migration studies prepared for use within the OECD. Authorship is usually collective, but principal writers are named. The papers are generally available only in their original language - English or French - with a summary in the other.
 

Capital's Grabbing Hand? A Cross-Country/Cross-Industry Analysis of the Decline of the Labour Share You or your institution have access to this content

Auteur(s):
Andrea Bassanini, Thomas Manfredi1
Author Affiliations
  • 1: OCDE, France

Date de publication
04 jui 2012
Bibliographic information
N°:
133
Pages
43
DOI
10.1787/5k95zqsf4bxt-en

Cacher / Voir l'abstract

We examine the determinants of the within-industry decline of the labour share, using industry-level annual data for 25 OECD countries, 20 business-sector industries and covering up to 28 years. We find that total factor productivity growth – which captures (albeit imprecisely) capital-augmenting or labour-replacing technical change – and capital deepening jointly account for as much as 80% of the within-industry contraction of the labour share. We also find that other important factors are privatisation of state-owned enterprises and the increase in international competition as well as off-shoring of intermediate stages of the production process. By contrast, we are unable to detect any effect from increases in domestic competition brought about by entry deregulation.
Classification JEL:
  • I30: Health, Education, and Welfare / Welfare and Poverty / General