Program for the CSLS Service Sector Productivity and Productivity Paradox Project
Chateau Laurier, Ottawa, Canada April 11-12, 1997

In recent years, the information technology revolution has transformed the service sector. Yet productivity growth in many service industries has been weak, or even negative. A key issue for economists, and for economic policymakers, is whether official data produced for the service industries truly capture changes in the real output, and hence changes in productivity. If the data do indeed reflect underlying reality, a second question, now known as the "productivity paradox", is why the information revolution is having no apparent payoff in terms of productivity growth. To address these two questions, the Centre for the Study of Living Standards (CSLS) organized a major international conference, which was held in Ottawa, Canada April 11-12, 1997. It was attended by a wide cross section of people from Canada and around the globe. The conference represented the second stage of a major CSLS project on service sector productivity and the productivity paradox coordinated by Erwin Diewert of the University of British Columbia, Alice Nakamura of the University of Alberta, and Andrew Sharpe of the CSLS. The project involves a network of over 40 researchers in nine countries (Canada, United States, United Kingdom, France, Netherlands, Sweden, Germany, Taiwan, and Australia). The project is being overseen by a Research Advisory Committee composed of leading economists in the area and representatives from government departments and agencies and from the private sector. The first stage of the project was a preconference in February 1997. The project's third stage will be publication of a special issue of the Canadian Journal of Economics on service sector productivity and the productivity paradox based on papers presented at the conference. NOTE: Many of these papers were published in the Canadian Journal of Economics, Volume 32, No. 2 . These papers, and others presented at the conference are linked in pdf format to the program below.

Conference Program     Friday, April 11, 1997 8:00 - 9:00 AM Registration and Coffee 9:00 - 9:30 AM Opening Remarks and Overview of the Issues Ian Stewart (Chair, CSLS) Andrew Sharpe (Executive Director, CSLS) 9:45 AM -12:00 PM   Session 1: Conceptual and Measurement Frameworks Chair: Ivan Fellegi (Chief Statistician, Statistics Canada) Peter Hill (formerly OECD) "Tangibles, Intangibles and Services:A New Taxonomy for the Classification of Output" Michael Wolfson (Statistics Canada) "Measuring Real Economic Growth with New Commodities: Experiments with the XEcon Artificial Economy" Erwin Diewert (UBC) and Alice Nakamura (University of Alberta) "Benchmarking and the Measurement of Best Practices Efficiency:Evidence from Electricity Generation" Discussants: Rick Harris (Simon Fraser Univervisty) Paul Schreyer (OECD) 12:00 - 1:30 PM   Luncheon Chair Jacob Ryten (Statistics Canada) Speaker: Zvi Griliches (Harvard University and NBER) "The CPI Debate and the Measurement of Productivity" 1:30 - 3:30 PM   Session 2: Service Sector Productivity Measurement I Chair: Harry L. Freeman (Mark Twain Institute) Bart Van Ark and Erik Monnikhof (University of Groningen) and Nanno Mulder (CEPII, Paris) "Productivity and Innovation in Services: An International Comparative Perspective" Leonard Nakamura (Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia) "The Measurement of Retail Output and the Retail Revolution" Discussants: Melvyn Fuss (University of Toronto) Pierre Fortin (Université de Québec à Montréal) 3:30 - 3:45 PM   Break 3:45 - 5:30 PM   Session 3: Innovation in the Service Sector Chair: Bill Watson (Ottawa Citizen) Georg Licht and Dietmar Moch (Centre for European Economic Research, Mannheim) "Innovation and Information Technology in Services" Note: This is a revised version of May, 1997. Stan Metcalfe and Ian Miles (PREST, University of Manchester) "Services: Invisible Innovators" Surendra Gera, Wulong Gu and Frank Lee (Industry Canada) "Information Technology and Productivity Growth: An Empirical Analysis for Canada and the United States" Discussants: Fred Gault (Statistics Canada) David Wolfe (University of Toronto) 6:30-7:30 PM   Reception 7:30-10:00 PM   Dinner Chair: Andrew Sharpe (CSLS) Speaker: Paul Davenport (President, University of Western Ontario) "The Productivity Paradox and the Management of Information Technology" Saturday, April 12, 1997 Concurrent Sessions 8:30-10:00 AM   Session 4A   Productivity in the Insurance Industry Chair: David Slater (CSLS) Tarek Harchaoui (Statistics Canada) "The Economic Performance of the Canadian Life Insurance Business" Mark Sherwood (Bureau of Labor Statistics) "Output of the Property and Casualty Insurance Industry" Jeff Bernstein (Carleton University and NBER) "Total Factor Productivity in the Canadian Life Insurance Industry, 1979-1989" Discussants: Paul Kovcas (Insurance Bureau of Canada) Michael Denny (University of Toronto) 8:30-10:00 AM - Session 4B Service Sector Productivity Measurement II Chair: André Miller (World Confederation of Productivity Science) Harry Postner (formerly Economic Council of Canada) "The Case of the Missing Data: Implications for Productivity Measurement" Pierre Mohnen (UQAM) and Thijs ten Raa (Tilberg University) "A General Equilibrium Analysis of the Evolution of Canadian Service Sector Productivity" Brent Moulton (Bureau of Labor Statisics) "Issues in Measuring Price Changes for Rent of Shelter" Discussants: Peter Hill (formerly OECD) Carl Sonnen (Informetrica) 10:00 - 10:15 AM   Break 10:15 AM - 12:15 PM   Session 5A Productivity in Banking Chair: Stewart Wells (Statistics Canada) Allen Berger (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and Wharton Financial Institutions Centre, University of Pennsylvania) and Loretta Mester (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and Wharton Financial Institutions Centre, University of Pennsylvania) "Efficiency and Productivity Trends in the U.S. Commercial Banking Industry: A Comparison of the 1980's and 1990's" Dennis Fixler (Bureau of Labour Statistics) and Diana Hancock (Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System) "Measuring Bank Credit Services: Large versus Small U.S. Banks" Dennis Fixler and Kimberly Zieschang (Bureau of Labor Statistics) "The Productivity of the Banking Sector: Integrating Financial and Production Approaches to Measuring Financial Service Output" Note: This is a revised version of May, 1997. Discussants: Jack Triplett (U.S. Department of Commerce and Brookings Institution) Tom Rymes (Carleton University) 10:15 AM -12:15 PM   Session 5B   Public Sector Productivity Chair: Steve Dorey (Ontario Ministry of Finance) R. Färe, S. Grosskopf (Southern Illinois University), F. Førsund (University of Oslo), K. Hayes (Southern Methodist University), and A. Heshmati (Gothenborg University) "Productivity and Quality in Swedish Schools" Pontus Roos (Swedish Institute of Health Economics) "Measurement of Productivity in Hospital Services using Malmquist Index Approaches" Charles Aspden, Leanne Johnson, Steven Kennedy, Ken Tallis and Richard Webster(Australian Bureau of Statistics) "Improving Australia's Productivity Statistics" Discussants: Lars Osberg (Dalhousie University) B.K. Atrostric (Congressional Budget Office) 12:00 - 1:30 PM   Luncheon Chair: Erwin Diewert (UBC) Speaker - Dale Jorgenson (Harvard University) "Computers and Productivity" 1:45 - 3:45 PM   Session 6   Explanations of the Productivity Paradox Chair: David Crane (Toronto Star) Erwin Diewert (University of British Columbia) and Kevin Fox (University of New South Wales) "Can Measurement Error Explain the Productivity Paradox?" Note: This is a revised version of May, 1997. It replaces the earlier version which was incomplete Edward Wolff (New York University) "The Productivity Paradox: Evidence from Indirect Indicators of Service Sector Productivity Growth" William Lehr and Frank Lichtenberg (Columbia University) "Information Technology and Its Impact on Firm-level Productivity:Evidence from Government and Private Data Sources, 1977-1993" Pascal Petit (CEPREMAP) and Luc Soete (MERIT) "The Productivity Paradox and the Measurement Issue: Is Biased Technical Change Fueling Dualism?" Discussants: Ellen Dulberger (IBM) Mike McCracken (Informetrica) 3:45 - 4:00 PM - BREAK 4:00 - 5:00 PM   Session 7   Panel    Perspectives on the Productivity Paradox Transcript - "Perspectives on the Productivity Paradox" Chair: Denis Gauthier (Industry Canada) Zvi Griliches (Harvard University and NBER) Rick Harris (Simon Fraser University) Jack Triplett (U.S. Department of Commerce and Brookings Institution) Closing Remarks: Alice Nakamura (University of Alberta) The Centre for the Study of Living Standards (CSLS) would like to thank Statistics Canada for its financial support of this conference. Without this support the project would not have been possible. The CSLS would also like to thank Industry Canada, the Ontario Ministry of Finance, the Insurance Bureau of Canada and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency for financial assistance.