Document Type
Working Paper
Publication Date
1-1998
Publisher
Boston University School of Law
Language
en-US
Abstract
This paper measures plant-level productivity gains associated with learning curves across the entire manufacturing sector. We measure these gains at plant startups and also after major employment changes. We find: 1) The gains are strongly associated with a variety of human capital measures implying that learning-by-doing is largely a firm-specific human capital investment. 2) This implicit investment is large; many plants invest as much in learning-by-doing as they invest in physical capital and much more than they invest in formal job training. 3) This investment differs persistently over industries and is higher with greater R&D. 4) Consistent with a learning-by-doing interpretation, the human capital investment is much larger following employment decreases than increases. We conclude that learning-by-doing is a major factor in wage determination, technical progress and asymmetric employment adjustment costs.
Recommended Citation
James Bessen,
Productivity Adjustments and Learning-by-Doing as Human Capital
(1998).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.bu.edu/faculty_scholarship/3327
