Fuentes del crecimiento económico y la productividad en América Latina y el Caribe, 1990-2013

Abstract

This document examines the growth experiences of 23 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean in four sub-periods of analysis between 1990 and 2013. Based on the availability of data, three types of exercises have been done. The first covers 18 countries in Latin America and five in the Caribbean, and uses traditional measures to measure capital, labor and efficiency. In the second, for only Latin American countries, the work measurement is improved by adjusting the number of hours worked by their “quality” (i.e. years of education), in addition to generating a measure of “capital services” to improve the quality of the capital metric. Finally, the third method uses the LA-KLEMS database to disaggregate information into nine economic activities, distinguishing in each three labor characteristics (gender, age and schooling) and eight types of capital assets. The exercises reveal that, as the gauging of inputs is improved, the measure for efficiency or TFP, which is usually positive and statistically explains a good part of the observed growth, becomes increasingly negative for all groups of countries in all sub-periods, except the boom period 2004- 2008 in which it remains positive but reduces its contribution.