Centre for Productivity and Performance

Events and activities

CPP Seminar: January 11th 2017

Economics & the Centre for Productivity and Performance, School of Business and Economics would like to invite you to:

Title: Semiparametric smooth coefficient estimation of a stochastic production frontier system

Guest Speaker: Dr Kai Sun, State University of New York at Binghamton (USA)

Date:   Wednesday, 11th January 2017, 2.00 pm – 4.00 pm

Venue: CC1.11 (James France building on campus) 

Abstract: 

This paper addresses endogeneity of inputs in estimating a semiparametric smooth coefficient production function using a system approach. The system consists of a translog production function and the first-order conditions (FOC) of profit maximization. Each coefficient of the production function is an unknown function of some exogenous environmental variables. This makes the production function observation-specific so long as the environmental variables are observation-specific. The estimation of the system involves applying the functional coefficient instrumental variable method (Cai et al., 2006) for the endogeneity of inputs in the first step, and the semiparametric smooth coefficient seemingly unrelated regression method (Henderson et al., 2015) in the second step. Using a Chinese food industry data set, we show that the semiparametric system approach gives the most economically meaningful input elasticity estimates compared with alternative models. We also calculate the returns to scale along with the technical and allocative inefficiency estimates.

Biography

Dr. Kai Sun was a Senior Lecturer in Economics at Salford and a Lecturer in Economics at Aston University. His research interests include applied microeconometrics, productivity analysis, and nonparametrics. He published papers on Journal of Applied Econometrics, Economics Letters, European Journal of Operational Research (4 star), Energy Economics, European Journal of Finance, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Empirical Economics, Journal of Productivity Analysis, Journal of Regulatory Economics, among others. His general R codes on estimating the marginal effects of environmental/policy variables on technical inefficiency have been translated and incorporated into the xtfrontier package of Stata for wider use. He is from Shanghai, China, and did his Ph.D. in Economics at the State University of New York at Binghamton, USA. More details here

Registration:

The event is free to attend and includes tea/coffee and cakes. To book your place on this event, please email Sbe.Research-seminar@lboro.ac.uk