Perceived Impacts of Technology Use on the Productivity of US Manufacturing Businesses

Gabe, Todd and Hunt, Elinor and Crawley, Andrew (2024): Perceived Impacts of Technology Use on the Productivity of US Manufacturing Businesses.

Abstract

This paper examines the perceived effects of technology use on the employment, revenue, and productivity of US manufacturers. Results from a 2023 survey of US manufacturers (n=268) show that 48% of the surveyed businesses perceive that technology use has “no effect” on employment, 16% perceive positive impacts and 12% feel that technology use lowers the number of workers employed by the business. By contrast, only 21% of the surveyed US manufacturing businesses believe that technology use has no effect on the company’s annual revenue, 50% perceive positive impacts, while just 5% feel that technology use has a negative impact on revenue. Taken together, survey results suggest that technology use increases the productivity of a hypothetical US manufacturing business by an average of 9.2%. When companies that do not use technology are removed from the analysis, the perceived positive impact of technology use on productivity rises to an average of 12.1%. Future research will take a more in-depth look at the effects of technology on manufacturing productivity, with a focus on the differential impacts of specific types of technology.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Technology use, US manufacturing, productivity
• Subjects: L - Industrial Organization > L6 - Industry Studies: Manufacturing > L60 - General; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Innovation ; Research and Development ; Technological Change ; Intellectual Property Rights > O32 - Management of Technological Innovation and R&D; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O3 - Innovation ; Research and Development ; Technological Change ; Intellectual Property Rights > O33 - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences ; Diffusion Processes

References

Dinlersoz, Emin, and Zoltan Wolf. “Automation, labor share, and productivity: Plant-level evidence from US Manufacturing.” Economics of Innovation and New Technology (2023): 1-23. DOI: 10.1080/10438599.2023.2233081

Gabe, Todd, Elinor Hunt, and Andrew Crawley. “Technology Use in US Manufacturing.” EDA UMaine Staff Paper 2024-113: Technical Report, April 2024.

West, Darrell M. “What happens if robots take the jobs? The impact of emerging technologies on employment and public policy.” Center for Technology Innovation at Brookings, Washington DC (2015).

West, Darrell M. “How technology is changing manufacturing.” Commentary, The Brookings Institution, Washington DC (2016).

Zolas, Nikolas, Zachary Kroff, Erik Brynjolfsson, Kristina McElheran, David N. Beede, Cathy Buffington, Nathan Goldschlag, Lucia Foster, and Emin Dinlersoz. “Advanced technologies adoption and use by US firms: Evidence from the annual business survey.” No. W28290. National Bureau of Economic Research, 2021.