Since the 90s, advances in information and communication technology (ICT) and the associated benefits are being reflected, nominally, in every sector, but not in growth accounting data. Paradoxically, in the age of robots, drones and smartphones, productivity has seen a constant slowdown in almost all sectors of the economy. According to the International Monetary Fund, if total factor productivity growth had followed its pre-crisis trend (equal to about 1% per year), the GDP of advanced economies would have been about 5% higher today, equal to the contribution that a country with an economic weight greater than that of Germany would have given.
In advanced economies, total factor productivity fell from growth rates of an average annual 1% in the period 2000-2007 to +0,4% in the years 2013-2016, zeroing out (0,1%) in the intermediate period. The causes of the decline can be found both in long-term structural factors (aging of the workforce, slowdown in international trade) and in dynamics closely linked to the economic cycle (decrease in investments, credit crunch, deteriorated balance sheets). The slowdown in labor productivity is particularly evident: in 2015 the annual growth of this variable in the United States was equal to a fifth of that of 1999 (+2,9%) while in the euro area it was around half.
The factors that have largely contributed to the decline in the efficiency of the labor force are a decline in capital intensity and above all in total factor productivity, whose annual growth in advanced countries fell from +1,9% in 2000 to +0,7% forecast by the Fund for 2022.
The empirical evidence for Italy shows a “structural break” around 1995: the labor productivity trend flattens out, while total factor productivity has an inflection point. The average growth rate of labor productivity from the 80s to 1995 was double (+1,9%) compared to the growth recorded in the second half of the 90s (+1%), while between 1985 and 1995, total factor productivity grew three times faster (+1,25%) than in the second half of the 90s (+0,4%) and four times faster than in the first decade of the 2000s 0,6 (-XNUMX%).
Attachments: Focus Bnl - The puzzle of productivity in the world and in Italy
