Andrew founded the CSLS in 1995 and served as its Executive Director for 30 years, until May 2025. Under his leadership, CSLS became a leading voice in the measurement and analysis of productivity, living standards, and economic well-being in Canada and internationally.
Over the course of his distinguished career, Andrew made outstanding lifetime contributions to advancing understanding of the trends and determinants of productivity and economic performance. He founded the International Productivity Monitor and served as its Managing Editor for 25 years, establishing it as a respected global forum for productivity research. He also co-developed, with Lars Osberg, the CSLS’s composite Index of Economic Well-Being, an innovative framework that has shaped research and policy discussions in Canada and abroad. In addition, he authored and managed hundreds of research reports, edited volumes, and other major analytical contributions.
Prior to founding CSLS, Andrew held several senior positions, including Head of Research at the Canadian Labour Market and Productivity Centre and Chief of Business Sector Analysis at the Department of Finance Canada. He holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from McGill University, a Maitrise in urban geography from the Universite de Paris-Sorbonne, and a B.A. from the University of Toronto.
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van Ark; Paul SchreyerIPM Issue 49 | Fall 2025 | pp. 1–2
Issue 49 contains six articles: Cette, Lopez, Nicoletti & Vernerey on the productivity gains from procompetitive regulatory reform in Canada; Andrews, Égert & de La Maisonneuve (OECD) on adult skills and productivity using PIAAC 2023; Kohli proposing Total Labour Productivity (TLP) as an alternative to standard ALP and TFP; Shaban on whether efficiencies defenses for mergers…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van Ark; Paul SchreyerIPM Issue 48 | Spring 2025 | pp. 1–2
Issue 48 marks the enlargement of the IPM editorial team with Paul Schreyer (former OECD Chief Statistician, now Research Director at ESCoE) joining as editor. The issue leads with an OECD article on AI and productivity, followed by a four-article symposium on the UK productivity puzzle (Martin on timing and drivers; Gouma, McCann & Ortega-Argilés on…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 47 | Fall 2024 | pp. 1–2
Issue 47 features two symposia: one on industrial policy and productivity (three articles: Mann on global fragmentation and domestic industrial policy; Coyle & Alayande on UK ‘accidental’ industrial policy in three sectors; Sargent on Canadian industrial policy in four sectors) and one on climate change and productivity (three articles: Pilat on the climate-productivity nexus; Obst on…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 46 | Spring 2024 | pp. 1–2
Issue 46 features a three-article symposium on International Productivity Growth: The Role of Intangibles, using the new EUKLEMS & INTANProd database (30 countries, 7 tangible + 8 intangible asset types). Two additional articles address the recent decline in Canada’s GDP per capita (Smith) and how managerial quality shaped macroeconomic recovery from the Great Recession (Cette, Lopez,…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 45 | Fall 2023 | pp. 1–4
Issue 45 comprises a five-article symposium on Canada’s productivity performance — with contributions from CSLS, Statistics Canada, Finance Canada, and Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada — plus three articles on measurement issues relating to capital depreciation, capacity utilization, and how national statistical institutes have responded to the OECD’s productivity and capital manuals.
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 44 | Spring 2023 | pp. 1–2
Issue 44 contains five articles: a review of pro-productivity institutions across 11 OECD countries (Pilat); a framework and estimates for non-profit sector productivity in the UK (Martin & Franklin); a comparison of MFP growth estimates across four major databases (Gouma & Inklaar); an analysis of productivity trends in West Asian Arab countries (Erumban); and lessons from…
Andrew Sharpe; Dan Sichel; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 43 | Fall 2022 | pp. 3–9 | Policy and institutions, Well-being and living standards
This introduction synthesizes the three Part II symposium articles, all authored by researchers at STATEC Research (Luxembourg’s National Statistical Institute research division). Sarracino and O’Connor apply DEA to estimate well-being efficiency across 126 countries; Peroni, Pettinger, and Sarracino examine how well-being in the workplace affects labour productivity in 30 European countries; and DiMaria, Peroni, and Sarracino…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 43 | Fall 2022 | pp. 1–2
Issue 43 contains the second part of the IPM Symposium on Productivity and Well-Being (three articles from STATEC Research plus a reflection by John Helliwell), followed by two regular articles: productivity growth and spillovers across European and American industries using EU KLEMS and GVC frameworks (Liu, Cheng & Sickles), and whether India’s trade liberalization in the…
Andrew Sharpe; Dan Sichel; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 42 | Spring 2022 | pp. 104–116 | Policy and institutions, Well-being and living standards
This introduction provides background on the IPM’s first-ever symposium on productivity-well-being linkages, arising from a virtual workshop held in November 2021. It discusses the motivation (the CSLS-TPI partnership; growing policy interest in well-being beyond GDP); the organizational process (call for papers, refereeing, seven accepted papers split across Issues 42 and 43); and a synthesis of the…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 42 | Spring 2022 | pp. 1–2
Issue 42 is a large issue (211 pages) comprising four regular articles and a first four-article symposium on productivity and well-being linkages (Part I). The regular articles cover: construction value chain productivity in Europe (Kuusi, Kulvik & Junnonen); the China effect on manufacturing productivity in high-income countries via input-output analysis (Lind); trading gains measurement using Törnqvist…
Andrew Sharpe; James AshwellIPM Issue 41 | Fall 2021 | pp. 98–117 | Labour
The median wage is a key metric to assess developments in the standard of living of the population. Productivity gains are passed on to workers as real wage gains. But in recent decades the proportion of labour productivity gains that are being passed on to the typical or median worker has fallen in many advanced countries,…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 41 | Fall 2021 | pp. 1–2
Issue 41 features a symposium on the relationship between productivity and pay in the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada. Four articles examine divergence (levels gap) and delinkage (incremental linkage), finding that pro-productivity policies still raise middle-class incomes even as other factors have driven productivity and typical pay apart. Two additional articles address the Penn World…
Andrew Sharpe; Bart van ArkIPM Issue 40 | Spring 2021 | pp. 1–2
Issue 40 marks a milestone: the CSLS now partners with The Productivity Institute (UK) as co-publisher of the IPM, with Bart van Ark joining Andrew Sharpe as co-Editor. The issue contains seven articles: pay and productivity in Canada (Williams); frontier firm benchmarking in New Zealand vs. small advanced economies (Zheng, Duy & Pacheco); causes of Japan’s…
The editorial overview for Issue 39 introduces six articles on: the UK productivity puzzle from a system perspective (van Ark & Venables); the impact of COVID-19 on the work-from-home share and productivity in Canadian industries (Blit, Skuterud & Veall); G-7 investment trends and productivity growth (Tang & Wang); competition, market power, and productivity in Scandinavian countries…
The editorial overview for Issue 38 introduces seven articles examining the productivity slowdown from multiple angles: cross-country differences in productivity responses (Smith); frontier-laggard dynamics in Portugal (Osterhold & Gouveia); the role of the ICT sector in the transatlantic slowdown (Gordon & Sayed); productivity convergence across industries in the U.S., Japan, and Germany (Baily, Bosworth & Doshi);…
The editorial overview for Issue 37 introduces seven articles on: the industry anatomy of the transatlantic productivity growth slowdown; firm-level evidence on digitalization and productivity in Europe; the China shock and innovation and productivity in Canadian manufacturing; frontier firms and productivity dispersion in Canada; R&D and productivity; consistency of quarterly and annual productivity indices; and the…
Andrew Sharpe; John TsangIPM Issue 35 | Fall 2018 | pp. 1–7 | Productivity trends and comparisons
Statistical appendix to IPM-35-3 providing NAICS industry list, charts of business sector labour productivity and TFP compound annual growth rates by sub-period (1961-2016), international GDP per hour comparisons, and CSLS TFP decomposition and industry contributions.
Andrew Sharpe; John TsangIPM Issue 35 | Fall 2018 | pp. 52–72 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article establishes the stylized facts of Canada’s post-2000 productivity slowdown, providing a comprehensive picture using Statistics Canada business sector data at both aggregate and industry levels (15 industries, 1961-2016). Key findings: TFP accounts for the lion’s share of the post-2000 slowdown; the slowdown was primarily a within-industry phenomenon, not due to resource reallocation; it was…
Issue 35 contains eight articles in two individual articles plus two symposia. The individual articles cover employment and productivity puzzles in U.S. manufacturing and the role of demand and digitization in the productivity slowdown. The first symposium (four articles) explains slower productivity growth in Canada since 2000, based on CEA sessions organized by CSLS and the…
The editorial overview for Issue 34 introduces seven articles on: the potential gains from more competitive regulation in Canada; capital measurement issues and the Canadian productivity slowdown; New Zealand’s productivity challenge; GVC structure and firm-level productivity; the post-2004 U.S. productivity slowdown; cyclical vs. trend productivity slowdowns in Europe; and the rise of the intangible economy.
Andrew Sharpe; James UguccioniIPM Issue 32 | Spring 2017 | pp. 25–43 | Labour
Standard economic theory predicts that in the long run, productivity growth ought to drive aggregate real wage growth. We consider this prediction in the case of 11 OECD countries, and find that eight of the 11 experienced slower median real wage growth than labour productivity growth over the 1986-2013 period. We decompose the gap between labour…
Andrew Sharpe; Giuseppe NicolettiIPM Issue 32 | Spring 2017 | pp. 1–5
Issue 32 is a special issue produced in collaboration with the OECD, featuring articles selected from the First Annual Conference of the OECD Global Forum on Productivity, Lisbon, Portugal, July 7-8, 2016. The OECD Global Forum was established in 2015 to share information on structural and policy drivers of productivity and to facilitate diffusion of best…
The editorial overview for Issue 31 introduces eight articles: the productivity paradox of the new digital economy; industry origins of Canada’s post-2000 productivity slowdown; the productivity-median wage gap in Canada; a symposium on Robert Gordon’s The Rise and Fall of American Growth (Sichel review + Gordon reply); and a symposium on total factor productivity (Oulton on…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 30 | Spring 2016 | pp. 98–110 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This review article provides a synthesis and critical assessment of the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) report Global Growth: Can Productivity Save the Day in an Aging World? The key stylized fact that motivates the report is the expected fall-off in GDP growth for the G19 and Nigeria from an average annual rate of 3.6 per cent…
The editorial overview for Issue 30 introduces eight articles on: GDP and productivity measurement in the digital economy; productivity trends and policies in Mexico; a Canada-Australia productivity comparison; U.S. agricultural productivity 1948-2013; productivity in Canadian freight railways; global productivity growth and aging; productivity convergence theory and evidence; and a review of Atkinson’s productivity strategy manifesto.
The editorial overview for Issue 29 introduces six articles on: the role of productivity in long-term fiscal projections for the Canadian provinces and territories; productivity in the residential care sector in Canada; agricultural TFP in Australia, Canada, and the U.S.; reconciling gross output and value added TFP; an empirical illustration using Australian industry data; and a…
The editorial overview for Issue 28 introduces five articles on: a new Fisher index formula for measuring industry contributions to labour productivity growth; the economic benefits of closing the Aboriginal education gap; the role of worker bargaining power in the pay-productivity linkage; the employment-productivity trade-off; and ICT diffusion and labour productivity growth in the U.S., Canada,…
Andrew Sharpe; Bert WaslanderIPM Issue 27 | Fall 2014 | pp. 40–63 | Sectoral and firm-level dynamics
The objective of this article is to evaluate the impact of the oil and gas industry on labour productivity growth in Canada since 2000 through an exploration of the various channels, both direct and indirect, by which the oil and gas sector affects aggregate productivity. The article sheds light on the paradoxical lack of a direct…
The editorial overview for Issue 27 introduces a symposium of five short articles by leading productivity researchers on priorities and directions for future productivity research (based on a closing panel at the IARIW/UNSW Sydney conference), plus four longer articles on the impact of the oil boom on Canadian productivity, intangible assets and Ontario productivity, forest products…
Vikram Rai; Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 26 | Fall 2013 | pp. 63–85 | Technology and innovation
In 2011, business sector investment per worker in information and communications technology (ICT) in Canada was only 57.8 per cent of the U.S. level, indicating an ICT investment per worker gap of 42.2 percentage points. Numerous explanations have been advanced to explain this gap, one of which is that the ICT investment data from Statistics Canada…
The editorial overview for Issue 26 introduces six articles on: the role of weak demand in explaining slower productivity growth; the sectoral productivity performance of Ontario industries; the sensitivity of MFP estimates in Canada and the U.S. to alternative methodologies; the measurement contribution to the Canada-U.S. ICT investment gap; the potential of firm-level data for productivity…
The editorial overview for Issue 25 introduces revised AEA-session papers on: the optimistic vs. pessimistic outlook for U.S. productivity growth; whether the IT revolution is over (Byrne, Oliner, and Sichel) with Syverson’s historical electrification comparison; the productivity-employment trade-off; and European productivity performance and prospects with Petit’s commentary.
The editorial overview for Issue 24 introduces nine articles, including the World KLEMS Initiative overview, a major symposium on measuring Canadian business sector MFP (with the Diewert-Yu lead article, Statistics Canada response, Diewert rejoinder, and comments by Schreyer and Harper-Nakamura-Zhang), a long-term productivity outlook for Canada among G-20 countries, a sectoral decomposition formula comparison, and an…
The editorial overview for Issue 23 introduces five articles on: business innovation strategies and Canadian innovation policy; new direct measures of computer technology adoption in Canada and the U.S.; the decomposition of the gap between productivity and median real wages in the United States; the relationship between educational attainment, employment rates and productivity in OECD countries;…
The editorial overview for Issue 22 introduces five articles on: where Canada’s productivity problem really lies and what to do about it; the link between innovation and productivity in Canadian manufacturing; deindustrialization in Sweden; industry contributions to GDP and productivity growth in Canada and the U.S.; and productivity trends in Canadian agriculture over the past half-century.
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 21 | Spring 2011 | pp. 82–94 | Labour, Well-being and living standards
This review article discusses the volume Ageing, Health and Productivity: The Economics of Increased Life Expectancy, which provides a detailed examination of the relationship between ageing and productivity. While the authors find some evidence of a negative effect of ageing on productivity, they conclude that at the aggregate level the effect is small. The review argues…
The editorial overview for Issue 21 introduces five articles on: a comparative industry perspective on the Europe-U.S. productivity divergence since 1995; a plant-level analysis of the post-2000 slowdown in Canada’s transportation equipment industry; a portrait of the productivity performance of the Canadian provinces; productivity challenges in Latin America and lessons for Canada; and the relationship between…
Andrew Sharpe; Eric ThomsonIPM Issue 20 | Fall 2010 | pp. 48–67 | Productivity trends and comparisons
The Centre for the Study of Living Standards has released new estimates of labour, capital and multifactor productivity growth and levels at the market sector, two-digit, and three-digit NAICS industry level for the Canadian provinces during the 1997-2007 period. This article exploits this database to shed light on the nature of the slowdown in labour productivity…
The 20th issue editorial overview notes Industry Canada’s decade-long financial support for the IPM. It introduces five articles on: the impact of the financial crisis on Canada’s potential output growth; the sensitivity of Canada-U.S. capital intensity and MFP estimates to depreciation assumptions; a sectoral and provincial decomposition of Canada’s post-2000 productivity slowdown; creative destruction and Finnish…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 19 | Spring 2010 | pp. 40–49 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This report presents a framework for decomposing aggregate productivity growth into within-sector effects and sectoral reallocation effects. This framework is used to analyze productivity growth in 12 Canadian industries for the 1961-2007 period and for several subperiods. The results do not support the common view that Canada’s weak post-2000 productivity performance is attributable to a reallocation…
The editorial overview for Issue 19 notes that a Fall 2009 issue was not produced due to funding matters, making this Issue 19. It introduces five articles on: recent world productivity developments; aggregate income measures and their implications; sectoral reallocation effects on Canadian productivity; productivity in regulated Canadian industries; and international financial and business services productivity…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultIPM Issue 18 | Spring 2009 | pp. 25–37 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article presents new estimates of multifactor productivity for the Canadian provinces for the 1997-2007 period. In contrast to earlier estimates, these estimates incorporate both changes in labour and capital composition or quality. Reflecting differences in labour productivity and capital productivity, multifactor productivity growth varies greatly by province. Newfoundland enjoyed the strongest multifactor productivity growth and…
The editorial overview for Issue 18 introduces seven articles covering: the relationship between education, productivity and economic growth; new estimates of multifactor productivity for Canadian provinces; the UNIDO World Productivity Database; and a symposium of four articles on the Council of Canadian Academies Expert Panel report on business innovation in Canada.
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Peter HarrisonIPM Issue 17 | Fall 2008 | pp. 16–27 | Labour
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 analyzes the reasons for this situation. It identifies four factors…
The editorial overview for Issue 17 introduces six articles covering: labour market policy effects on productivity in OECD countries; why real wages have lagged labour productivity growth in Canada; the ICT diffusion gap between advanced countries; ICT production and productivity in Sweden and Finland; TFP measurement in Argentina; and changes to U.S. national accounts.
Jean-François Arsenault; Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 16 | Spring 2008 | pp. 40–104 | Productivity trends and comparisons
Statistical appendix to IPM-16-2, providing growth accounting decompositions of business sector labour productivity growth in Canada and the United States for 1996-2000 and 2000-2006, plus provincial and industry-level decompositions of Canada’s labour productivity growth using Statistics Canada KLEMS data.
Jean-François Arsenault; Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 16 | Spring 2008 | pp. 14–39 | Productivity trends and comparisons
Since 2000, business sector labour productivity growth in Canada has averaged 0.95 per cent, 0.60 percentage points below the long-term trend established over the 1973-2000 period (1.55 per cent). In the United States productivity growth has continued to be robust beyond 2000, averaging 2.60 per cent per year. This article argues that Canada’s weak productivity growth…
The editorial overview for Issue 16 introduces two articles on Canadian business sector productivity performance and a three-article symposium on data requirements for better productivity measurement, covering productivity measurement problems, U.S. services data development, and international market services data in Europe.
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Daniel ErshovIPM Issue 15 | Fall 2007 | pp. 25–40 | Productivity trends and comparisons
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 different productivity levels. It estimates that in 2006 the net output gains arising from interprovincial…
The editorial overview for Issue 15 introduces five articles covering: product market regulation and productivity convergence in OECD countries with implications for Canada; the impact of interprovincial migration on aggregate output and labour productivity in Canada; the relationship between productivity and sustainable consumption in OECD countries; productivity growth in Chinese industries 1980-2005; and measurement of intangible…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 14 | Spring 2007 | pp. 20–37 | Policy and institutions
The objective of this paper is to develop a more comprehensive understanding, from a policy perspective, of key drivers of labour productivity in selected OECD countries and their impact on enhanced productivity performance. The paper first presents some general lessons from the productivity performance of OECD countries and international evidence of productivity drivers based on the…
The editorial overview for Issue 14 introduces five articles covering: recent U.S. productivity developments with a focus on the continuing role of services; lessons for Canada from international productivity experience; India’s productivity performance and prospects; measurement error in Canadian construction sector productivity; and the newly released EU KLEMS Growth and Productivity Accounts.
The editorial overview for Issue 13 introduces five articles with a strong Canadian focus: benchmarking Canadian economic performance (OECD), an economists’ manifesto for improving Canadian productivity, Canada-U.S. differences in annual hours worked, the impact of terms of trade improvements on Canada’s real income, and measurement of government output and productivity.
The editorial overview for Issue 12 introduces a special symposium of five articles on the Boskin Commission Report after a decade, examining its impact on price measurement in the U.S. and internationally, plus a review article on information technology and the U.S. growth resurgence.
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 11 | Fall 2005 | pp. 21–38 | Technology and innovation
This article documents that ICT investment per worker in the Canadian business sector in 2004 was only 45 per cent of the U.S. level, and investigates the factors behind this gap. While no single definitive explanation emerges, the article identifies potential contributors including industrial structure differences, the size distribution of firms, the relative price of labour…
The editorial overview for Issue 11 introduces seven articles on policies to improve productivity in Canada (featuring presentations from CSLS’s 10th anniversary panel), the Canada-U.S. ICT investment gap, the impact of fiscal policy on employment and productivity, manufacturing productivity in Sweden, and service sector productivity measurement.
Someshwar Rao; Andrew Sharpe; Jeremy SmithIPM Issue 10 | Spring 2005 | pp. 3–23 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article examines the puzzling slowdown in Canadian business sector labour productivity growth since 2000, falling from 2.8 per cent per year in 1996-2000 to just 0.9 per cent per year, while the United States accelerated to 3.8 per cent. The authors assess several potential explanations including weakness in ICT manufacturing, slower machinery and equipment investment…
The editorial overview for Issue 10 introduces six articles covering: the puzzling post-2000 labour productivity slowdown in Canada; an international perspective on Canada’s productivity performance; the role of demographics and labour force growth in shaping productivity; whether European labour productivity levels actually exceed U.S. levels; productivity trends in Asia since 1980; and a review of two…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 9 | Fall 2004 | pp. 15–28 | Measurement and methodology
Statistical appendix to IPM-9-2 (‘Ten Productivity Puzzles Facing Researchers’), providing three data tables: output per hour growth rates in OECD countries for 1950-1973 and 1973-2003 with post-1973 slowdown magnitudes; output per hour levels relative to the United States for 1950, 1995, 2000, and 2003; and industry contributions to the post-2000 productivity growth acceleration in the United…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 9 | Fall 2004 | pp. 15–24 | Measurement and methodology
This article identifies and discusses ten of the most important unresolved puzzles in productivity research — seven general puzzles and three Canada-specific. International puzzles include: the causes of the post-1973 productivity slowdown; explanations for the post-2000 U.S. productivity acceleration; why labour productivity levels in several European countries exceed U.S. levels; and the absence of a post-1995…
The editorial overview for Issue 9 introduces six articles covering: the magnitude of the Canada-U.S. productivity gap at the industry level; ten productivity puzzles facing researchers; the link between technology use, human capital, productivity and wages at the firm level; the effect of organizational innovation and ICT on firm performance in Canada; the effect of adjustment…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 8 | Spring 2004 | pp. 81–84 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This review article examines Jeff Madrick’s book Why Economies Grow (2002), which argues that market size and demand-side forces — rather than technological change — are the primary drivers of economic growth. The reviewer summarizes Madrick’s historical account of U.S. productivity growth from the 19th century through the post-1995 acceleration, including examples such as the interchangeability…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 8 | Spring 2004 | pp. 16–26 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article documents the sharp divergence in labour productivity growth between Canada and the United States after 2000, with U.S. business sector output per hour growing at an average of 4.6 per cent per year in 2001-2003 — a post-2000 acceleration — while Canada’s growth decelerated. The article attributes Canada’s weaker performance to its labour market:…
The editorial overview for Issue 8 introduces eight articles covering: a progress report on endogenous growth theory; recent productivity developments in Canada and the United States; monetary policy challenges in the new economy; ICT and productivity growth in the United Kingdom; business sector versus total economy measures of aggregate productivity; productivity measurement in services industries; the…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 7 | Fall 2003 | pp. 44–45 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This introduction to a three-paper symposium on future productivity growth in Canada provides context for the contributions by Wilson, Macklem, and Robidoux. It discusses the choice of aggregate labour productivity measure (total economy versus business sector; persons versus hours), the relationship between productivity and the sustainability of social programs, and alternative long-term productivity forecasts from Global…
The editorial overview for Issue 7 introduces eight articles covering: Canada’s long-run economic performance and prospects; the impact of capital accumulation on productivity growth in Canada; why Net Domestic Product should replace GDP as a measure of economic growth; a symposium on future productivity growth in Canada (introduction plus contributions from Wilson, Macklem, and Robidoux); and…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 6 | Spring 2003 | pp. 19–37 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article examines the long-term gap in aggregate labour productivity levels between the United States and Canada, estimating that total economy output per hour in Canada was 89 per cent of the U.S. level in 2002 using household survey hours data, or 81 per cent using establishment survey data. The article systematically evaluates explanatory factors including…
The editorial overview for Issue 6 introduces seven articles covering: lessons for Canada from the U.S. growth resurgence; factors explaining higher U.S. productivity levels relative to Canada; differences in annual work hours per capita between Canada and the U.S.; whether trend productivity growth has increased in Canada; the contribution of ICT-producing and ICT-using industries to productivity…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 5 | Fall 2002 | pp. 23–40 | Policy and institutions, Well-being and living standards
This article develops a framework for analyzing Canadian living standards and the policies needed to raise them, motivated by the goal of having Canada exceed U.S. living standards within 15 years. It reviews definitions and trends in living standards in Canada, the United States, and OECD countries, and decomposes the drivers of living standards growth into…
Jeffrey Bernstein; Richard Harris; Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 5 | Fall 2002 | pp. 3–22 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article documents the dramatic widening of the Canada-U.S. labour productivity gap in manufacturing since 1994, with Canadian output per hour falling from 87.7 per cent of the U.S. level in 1994 to 67.7 per cent in 2001. The authors find that roughly 70 per cent of the widening is attributable to the smaller size and…
The editorial overview for Issue 5 introduces six articles covering: the widening Canada-U.S. manufacturing productivity gap; a framework for raising Canadian living standards; the impact of two decades of British economic reform on productivity; productivity and policy reform in Australia; a guide to measuring government productivity; and a review of the volume Productivity Issues in Canada.
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 4 | Spring 2002 | pp. 1-2 | Labour, Productivity trends and comparisons, Sectoral and firm-level dynamics, Technology and innovation
The editorial overview for Issue 4 introduces five articles covering: recent productivity developments in the United States and Canada and implications for the Canada-U.S. productivity and income gaps; the importance of skills for innovation and productivity; the diffusion of ICTs and growth of the French economy over the past two decades; a structural perspective on the…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 4 | Spring 2002 | pp. 53–63 | Measurement and methodology
This review article examines the 2001 CRIW volume New Developments in Productivity Analysis (Hulten, Dean & Harper, eds.), assessing major advances in productivity research over the prior two decades. Topics covered include the history of the TFP residual concept, advances in productivity data and micro-databases, the vintage capital/embodiment approach, the relationship between productivity and the business…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 4 | Spring 2002 | pp. 13–16 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This note updates the productivity and income gap estimates from the accompanying article (IPM-4-1) following Statistics Canada’s May 2002 national accounts revision and minor U.S. data revisions. The revisions narrow the estimated Canada-U.S. gaps slightly: Canada’s GDP per worker fell from 86.6 to 80.2 per cent of U.S. levels over 1989–2001, and GDP per hour from…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 4 | Spring 2002 | pp. 3–13 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article examines aggregate labour productivity trends in the United States and Canada in 2001, assessing whether the U.S. productivity acceleration of 1995–2000 represents a permanent structural shift. It finds that despite a cyclical slowdown in 2001, U.S. productivity held up better than in previous downturns, supporting the structural shift thesis. In Canada, labour productivity growth…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 3 | Fall 2001 | pp. 69–78 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This review article examines Angus Maddison’s comprehensive study of world economic history, covering two millennia of population, GDP, and GDP per capita estimates for virtually all countries. Key findings highlighted include: Italy’s leadership in GDP per capita in the 16th century, the Netherlands’ subsequent rise, the U.K.’s dominance in the 19th century, and U.S. leadership since…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 3 | Fall 2001 | pp. 52–68 | Sectoral and firm-level dynamics
This article documents the poor productivity performance of Canada’s construction sector since the early 1980s, with real output per hour in 2000 well below early-1980s levels despite improvements in capital per worker and workforce educational attainment. The sector’s structural characteristics—geographical dispersion, heterogeneous output, on-site construction, high regulation, ease of entry, and cyclical activity—are identified as key…
The editorial overview for Issue 3 introduces six articles on productivity topics including the contribution of ICTs to Canada-U.S. productivity growth, Ireland’s economic boom and lessons for other countries, OECD productivity trends, international manufacturing productivity comparisons via the ICOP database, Canada’s construction sector productivity performance, and a review of Angus Maddison’s book on world economic history.
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 2 | Spring 2001 | pp. 52–58 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This review article summarizes two major 2001 productivity publications: Statistics Canada’s Productivity Growth in Canada and Industry Canada’s Industry-level Productivity and International Competitiveness Between Canada and the United States. Key findings include: significant imprecision in productivity estimates warrants caution; peak-to-peak growth rates are preferable for trend analysis; Canada’s overall productivity growth has been comparable to the…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 2 | Spring 2001 | pp. 3–10 | Well-being and living standards
This article examines why the Canada–U.S. living standards gap widened considerably in the 1990s. Using three measures—real GDP per capita, real personal income per capita, and real personal disposable income per capita—it shows Canadian living standards fell from 86 per cent of U.S. levels in 1989 to 78.5 per cent by 2000. The analysis decomposes growth…
The editorial overview for Issue 2 introduces six articles examining productivity and living standards. It summarizes articles on Canada–U.S. living standards divergence in the 1990s, the importance of innovation for productivity, the new economy and IT-driven growth in the United States, the role of IT in the U.S. productivity revival, the new OECD Productivity Measurement Manual,…
Andrew SharpeIPM Issue 1 | Fall 2000 | pp. 6–8 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article documents a renaissance in U.S. service sector labour productivity growth after 1995, with output per worker in the broadly defined service sector growing at a 2.4 per cent average annual pace in 1995–98, up nearly fivefold from the 0.5 per cent rate in the prior two periods. The acceleration was broadly based across service…
Andrew Sharpe; Leila GharaniIPM Issue 1 | Fall 2000 | pp. 3–5 | Productivity trends and comparisons
This article examines why trend labour productivity growth in Canada stagnated in the second half of the 1990s, in contrast to a sharp acceleration in the United States. It identifies five factors behind the U.S. productivity revival — a large high-tech sector, strong IT investment, low unemployment, Federal Reserve monetary policy, and statistical methodological changes —…
The inaugural editorial overview introduces the International Productivity Monitor, a new CSLS publication aimed at focusing attention on productivity’s importance for living standards. It summarizes the eight articles in the first issue, covering Canada’s new economy productivity outlook, the U.S. service sector productivity renaissance, a regional Canada-US living standards comparison, postwar OECD productivity convergence, price cap…
Ritisha Chittoor; Paul Pietraru; Andrew SharpeReport 2025-06 | November 2025 | 84 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
This report investigates recent trends in productivity growth within the U.S. manufacturing sector, highlighting a significant and persistent slowdown. By evaluating compound annual growth rates, we found that growth in manufacturing fell from 3.75 per cent over 1997-2011 to -0.51 per cent over 2011-2023, the largest slowdown of any two-digit NAICS sector. Using two- and three-digit…
Andrew Sharpe; Paul PietraruReport 2025-05 | November 2025 | 94 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report provides estimates for the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) for Canada for the 1981-2023 period. The IEWB is a composite measure developed by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards that assesses the economic well-being of Canadians through the lens of consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality, and economic security. The report…
Andrew Sharpe; Stephen TappReport 2025-04 | November 2025 | 45 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement
Over the past half century, Canada’s labour productivity growth has slowed dramatically, falling from 3.7 per cent annually in 1947–73 to less than 1 per cent since 2000. This paper asks whether weak public policy explains that decline and whether new pro-productivity policies could reverse it. Using long-run data and the policy typology of Van Ark…
Andrew Sharpe; Alisaleh ShariatiReport 2024-09 | October 2024 | 80 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
Productivity growth in Canada has been abysmal in Canada in recent years. Using either 2017 or 2019 as a base, output per hour growth in this country has been by far the weakest in the G-7. For two-digit NAICS industries, the transportation and warehousing sector has experienced the worst labour productivity performance, down 4 per cent…
Andrew SharpeReport 2024-08 | October 2024 | 43 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report updates the CSLS’s previous Atlantic Canada Momentum Index, tracking progress on a scorecard of 19 indicators in six domains: macro-economy, human capital, labour market, innovation and investment, standard of living, and overall life satisfaction. Atlantic Canada has gathered significant economic momentum since the mid-2010s, recording population growth and recording improvements across a broad range…
Peter Harrison; Andrew SharpeReport 2024-06 | September 2024 | 58 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This report provides a comprehensive review of the literature on productivity measurement in the public sector, prepared for the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat. It covers definitions, concepts, and measurement issues including frameworks for understanding inputs, outputs, outcomes, and productivity. An international survey of government productivity measurement practices in the United States, United Kingdom, New Zealand,…
Andrew Sharpe; Tim SargentReport 2024-03 | January 2024 | 24 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
This article provides a comprehensive but accessible account of the productivity landscape in Canada, including productivity developments and proximate explanations of trends. It provides an overview of basic concepts, metrics, trends, and types of analysis found in productivity discussion in Canada. Topics covered include productivity concepts and definitions, why productivity is important, measurement issues, data sources,…
Andrew SharpeReport 2023-03 | March 2023 | 53 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report develops and presents the Atlantic Canada Momentum Index, a scorecard of 20 indicators in six domains — macro-economy, human capital, labour market performance, innovation and investment, quality of life, and overall life satisfaction — to assess economic momentum in Atlantic Canada. Atlantic Canada has gathered significant economic momentum since the mid-2010s, recording population growth…
Andrew SharpeReport 2022-06 | October 2022 | 62 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
This report reviews the current state of firm-level productivity research in Canada and identifies directions for future research. It surveys methodologies and data sources used in firm-level productivity analysis, assesses key findings from the Canadian literature, and discusses gaps and priorities for advancing this research agenda.
Andrew Sharpe; Shahrzad Mobasher FardReport 2022-03 | March 2022 | 46 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
Interest in the topic of well-being has burgeoned in recent years as the weaknesses of gross domestic prod-uct (GDP) per capita as a proxy for well-being have become more apparent. At the same time, the global economy has experienced a productivity slowdown. Since productivity growth is recognized as being by far the most important long-term source…
Andrew SharpeReport 2021-08 | October 2021 | 92 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report presents estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality and economic security) for New Brunswick from 1981 to 2019. We find that the IEWB for New Brunswick increased at an average annual rate of 1.34 percent per year over the period. Among the…
Andrew SharpeReport 2021-03 | June 2021 | 93 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development, Sector/Industry Analysis
This report provides a detailed analysis of the productivity performance of New Brunswick’s manufacturing sector from 1997 to 2019. It examines labour productivity in terms of real value added and nominal value added per hour worked, competitiveness implications through unit labour costs, provincial comparisons, and industry-level productivity performance. Part Two focuses on explaining the post-2004 fall-off…
Andrew SharpeReport 2021-02 | March 2021 | 133 pages | Fiscal Policy, Trade
This report identifies the factors that explain the fall in Canada’s ranking on the World Bank Doing Business Index from 4th in the world in 2007 to 23rd in 2020, prepared for Global Affairs Canada. Canada ranked highest in 2020 in starting a business (3rd) and lowest in getting electricity (124th). Between 2007 and 2020, Canada’s…
Andrew Sharpe; Cristina Blanco Iglesias; Myeongwan KimReport 2020-07 | August 2020 | 62 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
The distribution of the gains of economic growth among workers and corporations has evolved over time. While an extensive body of literature has studied the fall in the share of labour income in the gross domestic product (GDP), less attention has been paid to the development of the components of its counterpart, the capital share. In…
Kimberly Wong; Alex Stephens; Andrew SharpeReport 2020-05 | August 2020 | 77 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report presents estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality and economic security) for Newfoundland and Labrador from 1981 to 2018. We find that the IEWB for Newfoundland and Labrador increased at an average annual rate of 1.75 per cent per year over the…
Andrew SharpeReport 2019-07 | September 2019 | 59 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report presents technical background and estimates for the B.C. Prosperity Index, a composite measure of prosperity for British Columbia tracking socio-economic indicators related to living standards and economic well-being. The index compares B.C.’s performance with other Canadian provinces, OECD countries, and Pacific U.S. states on multiple domains including the business environment. The report discusses the…
Andrew Sharpe; John TsangReport 2019-06 | September 2019 | 191 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development, Sector/Industry Analysis
The main goal of this report is to describe and explain the trends in productivity in Newfoundland and Labrador, as well as trends in the variables used in the calculation of productivity, including output, labour input, and capital input. The main take-away from the report is the importance of the oil and gas sector to the…
Nicole Johnston; Andrew SharpeReport 2019-04 | August 2019 | 39 pages | Fiscal Policy, Indigenous Economic Development
This report sheds light on the deficiencies in infrastructure faced by Canada’s remote Indigenous communities by quantifying the level of infrastructure in 236 remote communities in Canada’s North. This quantification is done through a composite index based on 13 infrastructure indicators, including availability of broadband, roads, airports, the electrical grid, health care, education, water, and housing,…
Richard Beard; Myeongwan Kim; Andrew SharpeReport 2018-06 | November 2018 | 35 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This report analyzes the relationship between full-time students aged 15 to 24 and unemployment in Canada for the 1976-2017 period. Over the past 4 decades, the stock of unemployed full-time students has increased by 87 thousand, from 43 thousand in 1976 to 130 thousand in 2017. As a result, the share of the total unemployment represented…
Andrew Sharpe; Cristina Blanco IglesiasReport 2018-05 | August 2018 | 36 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
This report updates CSLS economic projections for Canada and the provinces for the 2017-2038 period. Building on the 2015 CSLS study prepared for the Council of the Federation, the report incorporates new data from 2015, 2016, and 2017. Using a supply-side methodology, projections for real GDP growth are derived from trend labour productivity growth and potential…
Myeongwan Kim; Andrew SharpeReport 2017-08 | December 2017 | 39 pages | Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets
This report contributes to the debate on the role of Aboriginal people in the Canadian long-term economic growth by projecting the contribution of Métis people to future labour force growth in Canada as a whole and across regions under various projection scenarios. Based on our projections for the Métis labour force over the period 2011-2036, we…
Don Drummond; Andrew Sharpe; Alexander Murray; Nicolas MaskReport 2017-07 | October 2017 | 36 pages | Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets
The objective of this report is to contribute to the debate on closing socio-economic gaps between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people by projecting the contribution of Aboriginal people to future labour force growth in Canada as a whole and by region under various scenarios over the 2011-2036 period. We find that this contribution at the national level…
James Uguccioni; Andrew Sharpe; Richard BeardReport 2017-06 | August 2017 | 40 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
We develop internationally comparable estimates of the Human Development Index (HDI) for the Canadian provinces and territories over the 2000-2015 period. The HDI is a composite index composed of three dimensions (life expectancy, education and income) measured by four indicators (life expectancy at birth, average years of education, expected years of schooling and GNI per capita).…
James Uguccioni; Andrew SharpeReport 2016-16 | November 2016 | 34 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
Standard economic theory predicts that in the long run, productivity growth ought to drive aggregate real wage growth. We consider this prediction in the case of 11 OECD countries, and find that the majority have experienced much slower median real wage growth than labour productivity growth over the 1986-2013 period. We decompose the gap between labour…
James Uguccioni; Andrew Sharpe; Alexander MurrayReport 2016-15 | November 2016 | 45 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
Canadian labour is more productive than ever before, but there is a pervasive sense among Canadians that the living standards of the ‘middle class’ have been stagnating. Indeed, between 1976 and 2014, median real hourly earnings grew by only 0.09 per cent per year, compared to labour productivity growth of 1.12 per cent per year. We…
Andrew SharpeReport 2015-04 | June 2015 | 187 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
This report provides a detailed analysis of Ontario’s productivity performance over the 2000-2012 period. It examines trends in real GDP, labour input, capital inputs, labour productivity, capital productivity, and multifactor productivity at the business-sector level and by two-digit NAICS industries and three-digit manufacturing industries. The report also compares Ontario’s labour productivity performance with that of the…
This Canada case study, part of the Post-2015 Data Test initiative, examines Canada’s capacity to monitor and report on a post-2015 sustainable development agenda. The report assesses Canada’s data availability and quality across six thematic priority areas: ending poverty, ensuring quality education, creating inclusive economic growth, ensuring energy and infrastructure access, establishing a sustainable environment, and…
Andrew Sharpe; Bert WaslanderReport 2014-05 | December 2014 | 103 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
The objective of this report is to evaluate the impact of the oil and gas industry on labour productivity growth in Canada since 2000 through an exploration of the various channels, both direct and indirect, by which the oil and gas sector affects aggregate productivity. The report sheds light on the paradoxical lack of a direct…
Andrew SharpeReport 2014-04 | October 2014 | 96 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
In 2012, business sector software investment per worker in Canada was 40.7 per cent of that in the United States. The objective of this report is to deepen our understanding of the reasons for which Canadian businesses invest substantially less in software than their U.S. counterparts. The report reviews the state of the software investment landscape…
Andrew Sharpe; Anke Kessler; Martin ThunertReport 2014-02 | May 2014 | 39 pages | Fiscal Policy
This report, originally published by the Bertelsmann Foundation as part of the Sustainable Governance Indicators project, assesses the quality of governance in Canada from May 2011 to May 2013. The report evaluates policy performance and democratic quality across a range of domains including economic policy, social policy, environmental policy, and rule of law. It finds that…
Etienne Grand’Maison; Andrew SharpeReport 2013-05 | July 2013 | 173 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development, Sector/Industry Analysis
Propelled by the mining and oil and gas sector, Newfoundland and Labrador’s economy experienced impressive growth in the past decade. During the 1997-2010 period, real GDP in the province’s business sector increased at nearly twice the rate of Canada’s, while the province’s labour productivity growth was more than three times greater than Canada’s. This report provides…
Andrew Sharpe; Vikram RaiReport 2013-03 | May 2013 | 137 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
In 2011, business sector investment per worker in information and communications technology (ICT) in Canada was only 57.8 per cent of the U.S. level, indicating an ICT investment per worker gap of 42.2 percentage points. Numerous explanations have been advanced to explain this gap, one of which is that the ICT investment data from Statistics Canada…
Evan Capeluck; Andrew SharpeReport 2013-02 | May 2013 | 142 pages | Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets, Sector/Industry Analysis
The objective of this report is to review the prospects for Métis employment in the mining industry brought upon by a looming wave of retirements; to determine potential barriers to Métis employment in the mining industry; and to identify actions and strategies that the Métis National Council (MNC) and Métis Aboriginal Skills and Employment Training Strategy…
Andrew Sharpe; Brendon AndrewsReport 2012-10 | December 2012 | 54 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
The Index of Economic Well-Being (IEWB) – a composite indicator consisting of consumption, wealth, equality, and economic security – underwent several changes in the weighting of its components. For example, the final aggregation of the IEWB was changed to equal weighting after the IEWB was criticized for having a bias against sustainability; however, all weighting schemes…
Andrew Sharpe; Evan CapeluckReport 2012-08 | September 2012 | 50 pages | Economic Well-Being, Fiscal Policy
This report provides an overview of trends in income inequality, measured by the Gini coefficient, in Canada and the provinces over the 1981-2010 period, and investigates the impact of redistributive policies — taxes and transfers — on these trends. Canada’s after-tax income Gini coefficient was 0.395 in 2010, 23.7 per cent lower than the market income…
Andrew Sharpe; Blair LongReport 2012-06 | June 2012 | 98 pages | Sector/Industry Analysis, Technology and Innovation
Innovation is an important driver of productivity growth, which in turn is a major source of improvement in living standards. Given the growing importance of the natural resources sector in the Canadian economy, innovation in this sector is particularly relevant. This report, using a systems-of-innovation approach, analyzes the innovation performance of the Canadian natural resources sector…
Andrew Sharpe; Ricardo de AvillezReport 2012-05 | June 2012 | 131 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
Despite labour productivity growth somewhat above the national average over the 19972000 period, Nova Scotia’s level of business sector output per hour in 2010 was only 75.7 per cent that of Canada. This report provides a detailed analysis of Nova Scotia’s labour and capital productivity performance and the factors behind this performance. It identifies weak machinery…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2012-03 | May 2012 | 33 pages | Economic Well-Being
In both rich and poor nations, worrying about future economic dangers subtracts from the present well-being of individuals, which is why affluent societies have complex systems of private insurance and public social protection to reduce the costs of economic hazards. However, the citizens of poor nations (i.e. most of humanity) typically find both private insurance and…
Elspeth Hazell; Kar-Fai Gee; Andrew SharpeReport 2012-02 | May 2012 | 79 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report develops internationally comparable estimates of the Human Development Index (HDI) for the Canadian provinces and territories over the 2000-2011 period. The HDI is a composite index composed of three dimensions (life expectancy, education and income) measured by four indicators (life expectancy at birth, average years of education, expected years of schooling and GNI per…
Edward Wolff; Ajit Zacharias; Thomas Masterson; Selçuk Eren; Andrew Sharpe; Elspeth HazellReport 2012-01 | January 2012 | 67 pages | Economic Well-Being
We use the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-being (LIMEW), the most comprehensive income measure available to date, to compare economic well-being in Canada and the United States in the first decade of the 21st century. This study represents the first international comparison based on LIMEW, which differs from the standard measure of gross money income…
Andrew Sharpe; Christopher RossReport 2011-17 | November 2011 | 124 pages | Economic Well-Being
This paper, which represents the living standards domain of the new Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW), provides a comprehensive overview of trends, in a number of indicators of living standards, over the 1981-2010 period in Canada. Part one examines trends in average and median income and wealth indicators in Canada. Part two looks at the distribution…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2011-12 | September 2011 | 79 pages | Economic Well-Being
This report presents new estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality, and economic security) for 14 OECD countries for the 1980-2009 period. It finds that in 2009 Norway had the highest level of economic well-being and Spain the lowest. Canada ranked ninth among the…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2011-11 | September 2011 | 98 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report presents new estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality and economic security) for Canada and the provinces for the 1981-2010 period. It finds that the IEWB advanced at a 0.78 per cent average annual growth rate over the period, below the 1.32…
Alexander Murray; Andrew SharpeReport 2011-10 | August 2011 | 87 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
This report provides an assessment of human capital development in British Columbia. The province’s performance is above average according to the majority of the indicators we analyze, relative to both the rest of Canada and other OECD countries. However, this does not mean that there is no room for improvement. We identify four areas in which…
Andrew Sharpe; Alexander Murray; Benjamin Evans; Elspeth HazellReport 2011-09 | August 2011 | 95 pages | Economic Well-Being
This report presents estimates of the Levy Institute Measure of Economic WellBeing (LIMEW) for a representative sample of Canadian households in 1999 and 2005. The results indicate that there was only modest growth in the average Canadian household’s total command over economic resources in the six years between 1999 and 2005. Although inequality in economic well-being…
Andrew Sharpe; Simon LapointeReport 2011-05 | June 2011 | 75 pages | Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets, Regional Economic Development
The goal of this report is to investigate the relationship between educational attainment, remoteness, and labour market and economic performance at the reserve level for Aboriginal Canadians. The report uses reserve-level data on average earnings, GDP per capita, labour market indicators and distance to a service centre for 312 reserves. Using descriptive statistics, simple correlation and…
Andrew Sharpe; Alexander MurrayReport 2011-04 | June 2011 | 67 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
Canada’s labour productivity performance has been abysmal since 2000, both relative to our historical experience and to that in the United States. In theory, a deterioration of the health status of Canadian workers could explain slower productivity growth. However, the evidence does not support this hypothesis. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that illness and disability impose…
Andrew Sharpe; Alexander MurrayReport 2011-01 | February 2011 | 49 pages | Labour Markets, Technology and Innovation
This report has two aims. The first is to provide a descriptive overview of the services offered by private sector electronic labour exchanges (ELEs) in Canada. The second is to assess those services in terms of their likely effects on labour market matching, their accessibility, and the degree to which they satisfy the needs of all…
Andrew Sharpe; Fred GorbetBK-02 | September 2011 | 498 pages
On the occasion of his 80th birthday, the Centre for the Study of Living Standards honoured long-time CSLS Chair Ian Stewart and his distinguished professional career as an economic researcher and policy adviser with this festschrift volume. Released September 2011 and edited by Fred Gorbet and Andrew Sharpe, it contains papers from many of Canada’s leading…
Andrew Sharpe; Ali Ghanghro; Erik Johnson; Anam KidwaiReport 2010-09 | November 2010 | 134 pages | Economic Well-Being
This report explains why people living in certain regions or cities in Canada experience higher levels of life satisfaction or happiness. We make use of micro-level data from the Canadian Community Health Survey for 2007 and 2008. After a descriptive analysis of the data on happiness in Canada, the report identifies, through an econometric analysis of…
Andrew Sharpe; Ricardo de AvillezReport 2010-08 | November 2010 | 34 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
Based on an update to 2009 of the CSLS ICT database for Canada and the United States, this report provides an overview of developments in ICT investment in the business sector for both countries, focusing on the ICT investment gap. Nominal ICT investment in the Canadian business sector grew 0.6 per cent in 2009, outpacing the…
Andrew Sharpe; Eric ThomsonReport 2010-06 | June 2010 | 113 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
This report presents new estimates of the levels and growth rates of labour, capital and multifactor productivity for the Canadian provinces by industry for the 1997-2007 period at the market sector, two-digit, and three-digit NAICS industry levels. Also, estimates of the sources of labour productivity growth (capital intensity, labour quality, and multifactor productivity) are presented. Furthermore,…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultReport 2010-03 | February 2010 | 37 pages | Fiscal Policy, Indigenous Economic Development
The objective of this paper is to summarize the research done by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards (CSLS) on the economic impacts of improving levels of Aboriginal education. Improving the social and economic well-being of the Aboriginal population is not only a moral imperative; it is a sound investment that will pay substantial…
Andrew SharpeReport 2010-02 | February 2010 | 57 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
This report aims to accomplish three objectives: provide an assessment of Canada’s productivity performance; provide a synthesis of the productivity studies conducted by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards (CSLS) and the McKinsey Global Institute; and develop a framework for unbundling slow productivity growth in Canada and the widening productivity gap with the United…
Andrew SharpeReport 2010-01 | February 2010 | 69 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement
In recent decades, governments in Canada have pursued market-oriented policies at both the macro and micro levels. Economists believe that such policies should foster productivity growth. Since 2000, however, productivity growth in Canada has been dismal, much below that in the United States and below Canada’s historical trend. The objective of this report is to attempt…
Peter Harrison; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-14 | December 2009 | 149 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
This report examines the productivity performance of Atlantic Canada over the 1981–2007 period, addressing three questions: what has been Atlantic Canada’s productivity performance relative to the Canadian average and OECD countries; what trends characterize the region’s productivity drivers; and what policy changes would help close the productivity gap. The report finds that Atlantic Canada’s aggregate labour…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-11 | December 2009 | 106 pages | Economic Well-Being
This report presents new estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality, and economic security) for 14 OECD countries for the 1980-2007 period. It finds that in 2007 Norway had the highest level of economic well-being and Spain the lowest. Canada ranked ninth among the…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-10 | December 2009 | 115 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report presents new estimates of the Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) and its four domains (consumption flows, stocks of wealth, economic equality and economic security) for Canada and the provinces for the 1981-2008 period. It finds that the IEWB advanced at a 1.20 per cent average annual growth rate over the period, below the 1.58…
Peter Harrison; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-09 | October 2009 | 113 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
The forest products sector in Canada has faced hard times since 2000. In terms of productivity growth, the sector as a whole has performed poorly relative to the total economy average. Labour productivity in the sector grew by 0.38 per cent per year between 2000 and 2007, below the economy-wide average of 0.98 per cent per…
Celeste Bradley; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-08 | September 2009 | 63 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
In recent years, the productivity performance of oil and gas extraction in Canada has been dismal. Based on official real GDP and labour input estimates from Statistics Canada, labour productivity in oil and gas extraction fell 8.23 per cent per year between the 2000 cyclical peak and 2007, with capital productivity down 5.97 per cent per…
Celeste Bradley; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-07 | September 2009 | 70 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
In recent years, the productivity performance of mining in Canada has been very poor. Based on official real GDP and labour input estimates from Statistics Canada, labour productivity in mining fell by 2.21 per cent per year between the 2000 cyclical peak and 2007, with capital productivity down 0.28 per cent per year and total factor…
Jean-François Arsenault; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-06 | August 2009 | 47 pages | Economic Well-Being, Fiscal Policy
This report looks at how the economic crisis has unfolded in Canada and what will be the impacts on economic wellbeing. The shortfall is estimated to be approximately $12,000 ($2007) per capita. In other words, given no economic crisis, GDP per capita in Canada would have likely been $1,736 higher on average each year over the…
Andrew SharpeReport 2009-05 | July 2009 | 55 pages | Labour Markets
The objective of this report for the LMI High-Level Advisory Panel is to provide advice on best practices in LMI and policy suggestions to improve the Canadian LMI system. Based on a thorough analysis, it presents 20 recommendations to improve the operation of LMI in Canada in the areas of LMI data, LMI analysis and forecasting,…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultReport 2009-04 | June 2009 | 127 pages | Economic Well-Being
This report, which constitutes the living standards domain of the new Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW), provides a comprehensive overview of trends in a number of indicators of living standards over the 1981-2008 period in Canada. Part one examines trends in average and median income and wealth indicators in Canada. Part two looks at the distribution…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Simon Lapointe; Fraser CowanReport 2009-03 | May 2009 | 108 pages | Fiscal Policy, Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets
Investing in disadvantaged young people is one of the rare public policies with no equity-efficiency tradeoff. Based on the methodology developed in Sharpe, Arsenault and Lapointe (2007), we estimate the effect of increasing the educational attainment level of Aboriginal Canadians on labour market outcome and output up to 2026. We build on these projection to estimate…
Jean-François Arsenault; Andrew SharpeReport 2009-01 | May 2009 | 80 pages | Fiscal Policy, Indigenous Economic Development
Since 1999, thousands of Métis have received training and found employment through Métis Human Resources Development Agreements (MHRDAs). We estimate MHRDA activities’ annual fiscal impact, which includes include higher tax revenue, lower government transfers, mostly in the form of EI and social assistance, and lower health expenditures. Based on results from the 2007-2008 fiscal year, we…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Peter HarrisonReport 2008-10 | December 2008 | 66 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
Investment is one of the main drivers of productivity growth, which is the key determinant of living standards in the long run. Investment in British Columbia is lagging when compared to that of Canada, particularly in machinery and equipment and ICT investment. Going forward, a poor investment performance in BC would likely lead to below average…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultReport 2008-09 | December 2008 | 33 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
A brief analysis of British Columbia’s productivity performance and the state of the drivers of this performance reveals that five areas merit additional focus. These areas could be the object of further research in the context of a productivity series produced for the British Columbia Progress Board by the Centre for the Study of living Standards.…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Peter HarrisonReport 2008-08 | December 2008 | 87 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
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 report analyzes the reasons for this situation. It identifies four factors…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Alexander Murray; Sharon QiaoReport 2008-07 | November 2008 | 73 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
The Alberta oil sands reserves represent a very valuable energy resource for Canadians. In 2007, Statistics Canada valued the oil sands at $342.1 billion, or 5 per cent Canada’s total tangible wealth of $6.9 trillion. Given the oil sands’ importance, it is essential to value them appropriately. In this report, we critically review the methods used…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultReport 2008-06 | September 2008 | 46 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development, Technology and Innovation
In 2008, Statistics Canada, for the first time, made available estimates of information and communication technology (ICT) investment by province. Given the importance of ICT investment for productivity growth, these data are important for the comparative analysis and understanding of productivity growth by province. The objective of this report is to present the basic data on…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2008-05 | July 2008 | 66 pages | Economic Well-Being, Regional Economic Development
This report constructs an index of economic security for Nova Scotia using the CSLS methodology, covering the 1981–2007 period. It examines four components of economic security—security from unemployment, illness, single-parent poverty, and old-age poverty—and compares Nova Scotia’s performance to Canadian provincial averages. Nova Scotia ranked third out of ten provinces in 1981 and fourth in 2007.…
Andrew Sharpe; Meghna BanerjeeReport 2008-04 | June 2008 | 62 pages | Fiscal Policy, Trade
The main purpose of this report is to assess Canada’s performance in attracting foreign direct investment inflows. The study reviews the literature on the benefits of FDI, analyses global and Canadian trends in FDI, identifies various factors affecting the inflow of FDI, and details how Canada ranks relative to other major OECD countries on the most…
Andrew Sharpe; Ian CurrieReport 2008-03 | June 2008 | 80 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
The objective of the report is to survey and assess the existing economic theoretical literature and empirical evidence on the linkages between open and competitive markets (competitive intensity) and innovation and productivity growth. The report is divided into three main parts. The first part examines the state of economic theory on the relationship between competitive intensity,…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Simon LapointeReport 2008-02 | February 2008 | 175 pages | Labour Markets, Sector/Industry Analysis
The apprenticeship system is generally associated with the construction industry. However, the manufacturing industry actually employs a greater amount of persons in apprenticeable occupations than construction. With the rise in value of the Canadian dollar and increased international competition from developing countries, manufacturing industries must increasingly invest in the skills of their workers. Apprenticeship training is…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François ArsenaultReport 2008-01 | February 2008 | 49 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
In 2005, the CSLS published a report that examined spending on information and communication technology (ICT) in Canada and the United States between 1987 and 2004. It found that Canadian firms lagged considerably behind US firms in ICT spending and that this situation accounted to some extent for the lower labour productivity growth experienced in Canada.…
Andrew Sharpe; Celeste Bradley; Hans MessingerReport 2007-06 | December 2007 | 58 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
To achieve efficient allocation of resources in the health care sector, accurate measures of health care output and productivity are essential. According to official estimates of productivity produced by Statistics Canada, labour productivity in the business sector of the health care (excluding hospitals) and social assistance industry declined 0.28 per cent per year between 1994 and…
Andrew SharpeReport 2007-05 | December 2007 | 49 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This paper makes the case that productivity is Canada’s economic destiny and that Canada’s dismal productivity performance, both from a historical and international perspective, therefore represents our biggest economic challenge. It then puts forward three specific policies to improve Canada’s productivity performance: foster the diffusion of best-practice technologies; remove the provincial sales tax on purchases of…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Simon LapointeReport 2007-04 | November 2007 | 180 pages | Indigenous Economic Development, Labour Markets
Investing in disadvantaged young people is one of the rare public policies with no equityefficiency tradeoff. This report estimates the potential benefit for the Canadian economy of increasing the educational attainment level of Aboriginal Canadians. We find that increasing the number of Aboriginals who complete high school is a low-hanging fruit with significant and farreaching economic…
Andrew Sharpe; Anne-Marie ShakerReport 2007-03 | November 2007 | 67 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
The purpose of this study is to identify and assess the relevant measures and indicators of labour market conditions, as concern unemployment, in the context of current and future labour market and economic trends. It is also to verify whether and how the importance of these measures has changed over time. There are three main objectives…
Andrew Sharpe; Jean-François Arsenault; Daniel ErshovReport 2007-02 | July 2007 | 113 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development
Interprovincial migration has played an increasing role in Canada’s economy over the last three years. This report attempts to estimate the number of workers moving in and out of each province, and to estimate the total output gains due to interprovincial migration. It breaks output gains into two sources: gains due to increased employment, and gains…
Andrew SharpeReport 2006-05 | December 2006 | 108 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
The objective of this report is to shed light on the relationship between information and communications technologies (ICT) and productivity in the Canadian economy. The first part provides a detailed overview of ICT investment and capital by ICT component (computers, communications equipment, and software), and ICT investment and capital stock per worker by ICT component in…
Andrew Sharpe; Jill HardtReport 2006-04 | December 2006 | 155 pages | Economic Well-Being, Labour Markets
According to data collected by the Association of Workers’ Compensation Boards of Canada, 1,097 workplace fatalities were recorded in Canada in 2005, up from 758 in 1993. As Canadians work on average 230 days per year, this means that there were nearly five work-related deaths per work day in this country. The objective of this study…
Andrew Sharpe; Sharon QiaoReport 2006-03 | December 2006 | 103 pages | Labour Markets
Labour Market Information (LMI) is a policy instrument that governments use to coordinate labour market adjustments. Many approaches are utilized in the provision of this information in OECD countries. This report examines approaches in five OECD countries (Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, the United States and Australia) in order to assess their efficiency in facilitating adjustments…
Andrew SharpeReport 2006-02 | October 2006 | 80 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
The objective of this report is to develop a more comprehensive understanding, from a policy perspective, of key drivers of labour productivity in selected OECD countries and their impact on enhanced productivity performance. It is hoped that the project will inform and strengthen future policy development in the productivity area, particularly as to related to ensuring…
Andrew SharpeReport 2006-01 | April 2006 | 28 pages | Fiscal Policy, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This is organized into three main parts. The first section provides a perspective on future productivity growth in Canada. It discusses key productivity concepts, looks at current productivity trends, examines the forces affecting future productivity growth, and reviews productivity projections in Canada and the United States. The second section discusses the relationship between productivity growth and…
Andrew SharpeReport 2005-05 | December 2005 | 23 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Technology and Innovation
This paper provides an overview of issues related to the diffusion and adoption of advanced technologies and business practices in Canada. It argues that while R&D is important, most Canadian firms do not perform R&D and their innovation and productivity performance depends primarily on the diffusion and adoption of technologies developed elsewhere. The paper reviews the…
Andrew Sharpe; James GibsonReport 2005-04 | September 2005 | 98 pages | Labour Markets
This report provides an overview of the trends and issues related to the apprenticeship system in Canada. The report is divided into eight major sections. Section one presents two different approaches to the evaluation of the apprenticeship system, namely the school-to-work transitions perspective and the skills deficit perspective. Section two discusses theoretical perspectives on apprenticeship looking…
Andrew Sharpe; Olivier GuilbaudReport 2005-03 | May 2005 | 52 pages | Sector/Industry Analysis, Technology and Innovation
This report develops a set of indicators of innovation in Canadian natural resource industries and uses them to assess trends over time and compare Canada’s performance to the all-industries average and to natural resource industries in other OECD countries. Innovation indicators are organized across eight areas: R&D, skills, machinery and equipment, productivity, foreign direct investment, technological…
Andrew Sharpe; Jeremy SmithReport 2005-02 | February 2005 | 119 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
The main objective of this report is to conduct a survey and assessment of various indicators used by organizations, both in Canada and abroad, to measure attributes and the well-being of society at the economic, health, environmental, social, and cultural levels. The compilation includes a combination of quantitative and qualitative and objective and subjective indicators or…
Andrew Sharpe; Jeremy SmithReport 2005-01 | February 2005 | 51 pages | Labour Markets
This report examines labour market seasonality in Canada over the past three decades to assess what policies might best address seasonal economies. Key findings include: overall seasonality has declined since 1976 across a wide range of output and labour market variables, though unemployment rate seasonality has increased since 1996; seasonality is higher for young workers and…
Andrew SharpeReport 2004-03 | February 2004 | 79 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This report provides a literature review of conceptual and operational frameworks for macro-indicators of economic, labour market, and social well-being. It is organized into three parts: a discussion of general framework issues including aggregative versus non-aggregative approaches, variable selection, and evaluation criteria; a review of six particularly important frameworks including the EU Social Indicators, Human Development…
Andrew SharpeReport 2004-02 | February 2004 | 70 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This paper explores the linkages between productivity and social development from the perspective of synthesizing the findings of projects undertaken by the Centre for the Study of Living Standards in three related areas. The first is a project exploring the linkages between productivity and social well-being involving researchers from around the world and culminating in the…
Someshwar Rao; Andrew Sharpe; Jianmin TangReport 2004-01 | February 2004 | 58 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
The Canadian service sector has performed well in recent years in terms of labour and multifactor productivity growth, both in absolute terms and relative to the United States, offsetting much of the poorer performance of the manufacturing sector. Service sector labour productivity growth has also shown a marked acceleration in both Canada and the United States…
Andrew SharpeReport 2003-08 | December 2003 | 127 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Regional Economic Development, Sector/Industry Analysis
This report provides a detailed analysis of the manufacturing productivity gap between Canada and Atlantic Canada, prepared for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. It examines labour productivity levels and growth rates in manufacturing across Atlantic Canadian provinces relative to the Canadian average, decomposing the gap by industrial structure and within-industry productivity differentials. The report identifies the…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2003-05 | September 2003 | 37 pages | Economic Well-Being, Labour Markets
This report constructs an Index of Labour Market Well-being for OECD countries that measures the well-being individuals obtain through the labour market. The index has four components: average current labour market income, human capital, labour market equality (earnings inequality and low-wage employment), and labour market security (security from risks of unemployment, work-related illness, and poverty in…
Lars Osberg; Andrew SharpeReport 2003-04 | August 2003 | 60 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
This paper develops an Index of Economic Well-being (IEWB) for the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Germany, Norway and Sweden for the period 1980 to 2001 which recognizes four components: Current effective per capita consumption flows; Net societal accumulation of stocks of productive resources; Income distribution; Economic security. Since the Human Development Index uses…
Andrew SharpeReport 2003-03 | June 2003 | 83 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement
The objective of this paper is to document the evolution of the Canada-U.S. labour productivity gap and to offer an explanation of why Americans have been and continue to be, on average, more productive than Canadians. This focus on relative productivity levels is in contrast to the typical focus on the gap between productivity growth rates…
Andrew Sharpe; France St-Hilaire; Pierre FortinJS-02 | January 2003 | 235 pages
In January 2001 the Institute for Research on Public Policy and the Centre for the Study of Living Standards organised a major public conference in Ottawa on the linkages between economic growth and inequality. Its objectives were to bring the most recent research on growth-inequality linkages in developed economies — with particular reference to Canada and…
Andrew Sharpe; Keith Banting; France St-HilaireBK-04 | December 2002 | 332 pages
The second volume in the Review of Economic Performance and Social Progress series asks what productivity means socially, and whether productivity growth should be a social priority. Organised in five parts, it opens with productivity concepts, trends and international comparisons, then examines the impact of productivity on government fiscal balances and environmental sustainability, the social determinants…
Andrew Sharpe; David HowellCP-08 | September 2002 | 407 pages
A working conference of the Ford Foundation project on the development of a new cross-national architecture for labour market statistics, held at Bellagio. The programme was organised around three team themes — labour market performance, labour market capacity, and labour market well-being — with each paper followed by a designated discussant and each theme closing with…
Andrew Sharpe; Someshwar RaoBK-05 | May 2002 | 85 pages
An 884-page volume in the Industry Canada Research Series bringing together twenty-five studies on Canadian productivity, undertaken in-house by Industry Canada or commissioned from outside researchers. Several had already figured prominently in the productivity debate; many were published here for the first time. The volume is organised in six parts: productivity trends and determinants; innovation and…
Andrew SharpeReport 2001-01 | April 2001 | 29 pages | Labour Markets, Productivity and Economic Measurement
The gap between Canadian and U.S. living standards widened considerably in the 1990s. Americans, on average, were 16 per cent better off in terms of real personal income per capita in 2000 than in 1989, while Canadians experienced a 5 percent increase in real incomes. The thesis of this paper is that this divergence to a…
Andrew Sharpe; France St-HilaireCP-07 | January 2001 | 712 pages
A major public conference organised jointly by the Institute for Research on Public Policy and the Centre for the Study of Living Standards, with two objectives: to bring the most recent research on the linkages between economic growth and inequality in developed economies — with particular reference to Canada and the United States — to the…
Andrew Sharpe; Keith Banting; France St-HilaireBK-03 | June 2001 | 312 pages
The inaugural volume of the Review of Economic Performance and Social Progress, a book series established in 2001 through a collaboration between the Centre for the Study of Living Standards and the Institute for Research on Public Policy. The series was founded on two fundamental beliefs: that the integration of economic and social objectives lies at…
Andrew Sharpe; Patrick GradyBK-01 | October 2001 | 485 pages
This volume celebrates the remarkable career of David Slater, which in the best Queen’s University tradition of John Deutsch and Clifford Clark spanned academia and public service, on the occasion of his 80th birthday. It follows the academic tradition of assembling, at an appropriate stage in the career of an eminent scholar, a volume in their…
Andrew Sharpe; Someshwar Rao; Erwin DiewertCP-06 | September 2000 | 162 pages
An invitational CSLS-Industry Canada workshop structured around six commissioned review papers, each surveying the state of knowledge in one area of productivity research and each followed by a designated discussant: productivity trends and determinants in Canada (Erwin Diewert), innovation and productivity (Jeff Bernstein), investment and productivity (Ronald Giammarino), global linkages and productivity (John Ries), productivity in…
Andrew Sharpe; Richard Harris; Jeffrey BernsteinCP-05 | January 2000 | 598 pages
Despite the extensive structural reforms the Canadian economy underwent in the 1990s, there had been no narrowing of the gap in manufacturing labour productivity levels between Canada and the United States; indeed the gap had widened, with important implications for Canadian competitiveness and relative living standards. To address slower manufacturing productivity growth and lower productivity levels…
Andrew Sharpe; Tim SargentJS-01 | July 2000 | 253 pages
With the decline in demand-deficient unemployment in Canada during the 1990s, the relative importance of structural unemployment increased. This special issue of Canadian Public Policy contains revised versions of papers presented at the CSLS conference on the structural aspects of unemployment, held in Ottawa on April 22-23, 1999, which the CSLS organised at the request of…
Andrew SharpeReport 1999-03 | December 1999 | 59 pages | Labour Markets
This paper reviews apprenticeship trends in Canada over the two decades from 1977 to 1997, and examines prospects for labour market conditions in the construction sector to 2005. It identifies several serious weaknesses in the apprenticeship system: stagnation in new registrations during the 1990s; the inability to expand beyond traditional fields such as the construction trades…
Andrew SharpeReport 1999-02 | March 1999 | 21 pages | Productivity and Economic Measurement, Sector/Industry Analysis
In recent months, the issue of productivity has risen to the top of the federal government’s economic policy agenda. The motivation for this development has been the perception that Canada’s aggregate productivity performance has been dismal in the 1990s, particularly relative to the United States. This perception is indeed true when productivity is measued on a…
As a new millennium approached, Industry Canada asked a group of experts to provide their vision for Canada in the twenty-first century on a number of important issues. The authors first identified major historical trends and developed scenarios to illustrate how trends in their areas might unfold over the following ten to fifteen years, then identified…
Andrew Sharpe; Tim SargentCP-03 | April 1999 | 520 pages
A CSLS conference examining the structural aspects of unemployment in Canada, organised at the request of Finance Canada and Human Resources Development Canada. Much of the increase in Canadian unemployment in the early 1990s had been reversed, although the employment-population ratio remained well below previous peaks; the conference set out to shed new light on the…
Andrew Sharpe; Louis GrignonJS-04 | May 1999 | 87 pages
A major development in the Canadian labour market in the 1990s was the decline in labour force participation, with important implications for living standards and for the conduct of macroeconomic policy. This issue of Canadian Business Economics consists of a symposium on that decline. The idea came out of a December 1997 workshop organised by the…
Andrew Sharpe; Alice O. Nakamura; Erwin DiewertJS-03 | April 1999 | 368 pages
In 1996 the Centre for the Study of Living Standards initiated an international research project on service sector productivity and the productivity paradox, bringing together leading economists from eight countries to shed light on two related issues: the measurement of service sector productivity, and the paradox that lagging productivity growth has occurred despite revolutionary advances in…
Andrew SharpeReport 1999-cprn | July 1999 | 72 pages | Economic Well-Being, Productivity and Economic Measurement
In recent years, interest in aggregate or composite indicators of economic and social well-being at the community, national and international levels has grown greatly. For example, the release each year of the United Nations’ Human Development Index generates considerable media interest, particularly in Canada. Equally, the Genuine Progress Index produced by the think tank Redefining Progress…
Andrew Sharpe; Lars OsbergCP-02 | October 1998 | 952 pages
The second stage of a major CSLS project on the state of living standards and quality of life in Canada, coordinated by Lars Osberg (Dalhousie University) and Andrew Sharpe (CSLS), involving nearly fifty researchers from Canada, the United States and Europe and overseen by a research advisory committee of more than thirty-five representatives of government departments…
Andrew Sharpe; W. Craig RiddellJS-05 | April 1998 | 47 pages
From Canada’s viewpoint, one of the most important labour market developments of the 1980s and 1990s was the divergence of the Canadian and American unemployment rates after 1981. In 1995 the newly established Centre for the Study of Living Standards initiated a research project on the Canada-US unemployment rate gap, bringing together labour economists from both…
Andrew Sharpe; Alice O. Nakamura; Erwin DiewertCP-01 | April 1997 | 886 pages
The second stage of a major CSLS project on service sector productivity and the productivity paradox, coordinated by Erwin Diewert (UBC), Alice Nakamura (University of Alberta) and Andrew Sharpe (CSLS), involving a network of over forty researchers in nine countries. In recent years the information technology revolution had transformed the service sector, yet productivity growth in…
