European Firm Concentration and Aggregate Productivity

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Bighelli, Tommaso; di Mauro, Filippo; Melitz, Marc J.; Mertens, Matthias
• 署名单位: Leibniz Association; Leibniz Institut fur Wirtschaftsforschung Halle (IWH); Harvard University
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1542-4766
• DOI: 10.1093/jeea/jvac040
• 发表日期: 2023
• 页码: 455-483
• 关键词: MARKET POWER; us industries; TRADE; fall; rise; EFFICIENCY; markups; prices

摘要

This paper derives a European Herfindahl-Hirschman concentration index from 15 micro-aggregated country datasets. In the last decade, European concentration rose due to a reallocation of economic activity toward large and concentrated industries. Over the same period, productivity gains from an increasing allocative efficiency of the European market accounted for 50% of European productivity growth while markups stayed constant. Using country-industry variation, we show that changes in concentration are positively associated with changes in productivity and allocative efficiency. This holds across most sectors and countries and supports the notion that rising concentration in Europe reflects a more efficient market environment rather than weak competition and rising market power.