Industry-level Productivity and International Competitiveness Between Canada and the United States

The objectives of this compilation of papers are to quantify the sources of economic growth at the industry level in Canada & the United States and to assess the relative competitiveness of Canadian & US industries. The first paper focusses on the recent revival of US economic growth, attributing the rise in growth to a surge of investment in computers, software, & communications equipment and to a jump in the growth rate of total factor productivity. The second paper adopts constant quality indices of capital & labour inputs to each of 122 industries studied in Canada. Five asset types and 168 labour input types are considered in an assessment of output growth and its sources. The third paper compares output growth between Canada & the US in 33 industries, aggregating capital input in both countries to four asset types so that the underlying data used in the study are compatible. The final paper focusses on international competitiveness between Canadian & US industries, first constructing purchasing power parities (PPPs) for output & inputs by industry, then using hourly labour compensation rates to estimate labour input PPPs. Appendices include additional papers on estimating output, capital services, labour input, productivity, capital inputs, workforce composition, and net capital stock & depreciation profiles.