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Better understanding about the drivers of aggregate productivity and wage inequality requires data that offer a representative picture of the underlying firm-level heterogeneity but are, at the same time, able to reproduce patterns observed in aggregate data. The OECD MultiProd project aims to generate such data by collaborating with a network of national experts who apply a harmonised statistical code to representative business microdata across a large number of countries. This paper compares the project’s output to the OECD STAN database to test to what extent MultiProd data can be taken as reflecting the aggregate economies in question, and if they are able to reproduce patterns observed in aggregate data across years, industries and countries. The results suggest that (1) MultiProd captures a major part of gross output, value added and employment in most of the countries covered; and (2) MultiProd reproduces aggregate patterns relatively well, with median correlations over time, across industries and across countries between 0.75.

Subjective well-being has in recent years been recognised as a goal of development that captures non-monetary or subjective dimensions of well-being. The body of evidence on the individual and societal determinants of subjective well-being is growing, but the literature remains in its infancy as to the role of social protection despite important policy implications. The objective of this paper is to explore the relationship between investments in social protection (as a proxy for the level of social protection services received by the population) and individuals’ evaluative and experienced well-being. This paper thus provides new evidence on the relationship between social protection investments and subjective well-being based on a worldwide sample including 38 countries and covering low-, middle- and high-income countries. Furthermore, we study potential channels explaining this relationship by considering the effect on potential beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries as well as distributional effects.

In light of the many discussions advocating the use of pay-for-performance and performance budgeting, this paper argues that discouraging experience with both approaches should temper expectations that performance measurement can be a reform that will make health care systems more "sustainable" or even more efficient. The link between sustainability and efficiency is tenuous, and attention to performance is not new. Measurement's accuracy tends to be overstated and its costs understated or ignored. Nor does it easily lead to changed behaviour. Yet some measurement is useful for managing any complex activity. In particular, there are situations in which measures are more accurate and the proper responses to shortfalls are generally agreed. Policymakers should look for those conditions and encourage the more limited, targeted improvement that measures then can make possible.

The digital economy has created some new measurement challenges for macroeconomic statistics and may have exacerbated some older ones, raising some concerns about the scope and estimation of GDP. Against a backdrop of slowing rates of measured productivity growth, this has raised questions about the conceptual basis of GDP and output, and whether current compilation methods are adequate to capture them (known as the mismeasurement hypothesis). In response to these concerns the international statistics community has reinforced efforts to investigate these concerns, chiefly under the vehicle of OECD-IMF collaboration and a newly formed Advisory Expert Group working under the auspices of the OECD’s Committee for Statistics and Statistical Policy. This paper is intended to provide momentum to these on-going efforts and to address immediate concerns about the potential scale of GDP mismeasurement in key areas where mismeasurement is often suspected. Notwithstanding the need for further work in some areas, notably with regards to cross-border transactions as well as potential mismeasurement in other macro-economic statistics, such as the consumer prices index, this paper concludes that even if mismeasurement is occurring, its scale is not sufficient to explain the widespread slowdown in measured GDP growth or multi-factor productivity growth. Nevertheless it’s important to note that this is a backward looking exercise. Even though the distortionary impact of any potential mismeasurement is currently thought to be small the growing size of digitised transactions could point to larger impacts in the future.

Services employ an ever-increasing share of workers in all OECD countries. This trend is likely to continue as it reflects deep structural forces, such as increasing consumption of services with rising incomes and population ageing and the growing role of intangible assets. Services are very diverse, but overall tend to have weaker productivity levels and growth rates than manufacturing. As a result, the shift to services entails a moderate but persistent drag on productivity growth. Still, there are reasons to hope for a pick-up in service productivity in the future, including thanks to new technologies (e.g. digital platforms, artificial intelligence). This concerns both “knowledge intensive” services (e.g. information and communication) and less knowledge intensive ones (e.g. personal transport). Harnessing this productivity potential requires adjusting policies to foster innovation and efficient use of new technologies, enhance competitive forces by reducing information asymmetries, barriers to entry and switching costs, and increase the tradability of services within countries and across borders.

The early detection of state and local fiscal problems can help in resolving them quickly before they turn into crises. Early detection should be easier if subnational governments prepare high-quality accounts. A survey and case studies were therefore undertaken to investigate the nature of subnational accounting in OECD and key partner countries, as well as the use of subnational accounts by national governments that monitor subnational finances. The results show that in many countries subnational accounting has characteristics that should help in the early detection of fiscal problems, including the use of accrual accounts prepared according to largely harmonised standards. Many national governments use a wide range of indicators from the accounts to monitor the financial health of subnational governments. However, there is room for progress including in the monitoring of non-financial assets and reporting of currently off-balance sheet liabilities.

It is well-known that there are large disparities in academic achievement between children of different socio-economic status (SES) backgrounds. This study examines the evolution of disparities in literacy skills between adults of different SES backgrounds. It compares countries’ patterns in the evolution of disparities in literacy by SES background as cohorts age and asks which patterns of educational and labour force participation predict a narrowing rather than a widening of these disparities. Since there is no international longitudinal study of skills across the entire adult life span, this study uses three cross-sectional international adult studies (International Adult Literacy Survey, Adult Literacy and Lifeskills and Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies) and matches birth years to create synthetic cohorts. Results indicate that there is large cross-national variation in the evolution of skills disparities associated with SES background. Disparities in literacy proficiency tend to widen when SES disparities in high school completion, professional and blue-collar employment increase. Disparities narrow when workers exit the labour force, a finding that is explained by the large inequalities in the employment experiences of individuals from different SES backgrounds, measured by differences in use of literacy skills at work. These results help to explain cross-national variation in the evolution of skills disparities by SES background, which has implications for policies aimed at closing skills gaps over the life course.

Canada has an ambitious plan to reduce the economy’s net emissions to zero by 2050. This will require a step change in mitigation action, with deep energy savings and near economy-wide replacement of fossil fuels with clean energy. Achieving this while minimising negative impacts on activity and living standards will be challenging. Canada is already using a range of policy instruments to propel its green transition – including carbon pricing, regulations, investment incentives, and public procurement of green technology. This Paper explores reforms that could make climate policies work better together to lock in both deep emissions reductions and strong economic growth. As with important efforts to prepare communities for the impacts of climate change, Canada’s provinces and territories will play a key role in the country’s green transition.

There has been increasing awareness in recent years that the development of indicators is central to effectively monitoring human rights, particularly economic, social, and cultural rights, and evaluating the performance of countries in implementing these rights. Effectivemonitoring requires the systematic collection and analysis of appropriate data. To determine which data are relevant, it is first necessary to translate the abstract legal norms in which various human rights are framed into operational standards. This process involves conceptualising specific enumerated rights, for example the right to education, and developing standards by which to measure implementation and identify violations of state obligations. These standards or indicators can then provide yardsticks to assess compliance. Human rights indicators offer a tool for the following: making better policies and monitoring progress; identifying the unintended impacts of laws, policies and practices; determining which actors are having an impact on the realisation or non-realisation of rights; revealing whether the obligations of these actors are being met; giving early warning of potential violations so as to enable prompt preventive action; enhancing social consensus on difficult trade-offs required in the face of resource constraints; and exposing issues that had been neglected or silenced (UNDP, 2000, p.89).

This note begins by briefly addressing why competition policy is important for developing and transitioning economies. It then discusses some of the critical components of building a competition culture. Ideally, this process should begin by conducting a "needs assessment" in a number of areas. This assessment likely will lead to the identification of a list of steps that should be prioritised and undertaken. The priorities often can be grouped into three broad areas, namely, helping key constituencies to "buy in" to a competition culture, minimizing the extent to which a broad range of institutional mechanisms distort competition, and building an effective competition law enforcement regime to address private anticompetitive conduct. The note then summarizes the valuable perspectives of countries that have been providers or recipients of capacity building and technical assistance. It is based upon the responses to a questionnaire circulated in 2001 to delegates of the OECD’s Competition Committee and non-members who had been invited to participate in the second Global Forum on Competition, held in February 2002. This discussion is followed by a brief discussion of the potentially helpful roles that cooperation and peer review can play in the process of building the institutional capacity of a domestic enforcement authority. After briefly discussing the Doha Declaration, the note summarises the OECD’s capacity building activities in the competition field. Finally, in the conclusion, some suggestions are offered regarding a multi-faceted strategy for future capacity building and technical assistance activities.