Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
In other words, returns to scale analysis is a long-term theory because a company can only change the scale of production in the long run by changing factors of production, such as building new facilities, investing in new machinery, or improving technology.
The assumption of constant returns to scale CRS is useful because it exhibits a diminishing returns in a factor. Under constant returns to scale, doubling both capital and labor leads to a doubling of the output.
At the base of economies of scale there are also returns to scale linked to statistical factors. In fact, the greater of the number of resources involved, the smaller, in proportion, is the quantity of reserves necessary to cope with unforeseen contingencies (for instance, machine spare parts, inventories, circulating capital, etc.).
The presence of increasing returns means that a one percent increase in the usage levels of all inputs would result in a greater than one percent increase in output; the presence of decreasing returns means that it would result in a less than one percent increase in output. Constant returns to scale is the in-between case.
There are three common ways to incorporate technology (or the efficiency with which factors of production are used) into a production function (here A is a scale factor, F is a production function, and Y is the amount of physical output produced): Hicks-neutral technology, or "factor augmenting": = (,)
The shape of the long-run marginal and average costs curves is influenced by the type of returns to scale. The long-run is a planning and implementation stage. [6] [7] Here a firm may decide that it needs to produce on a larger scale by building a new plant or adding a production line. The firm may decide that new technology should be ...
A represents total factor productivity, K is capital, L is labor, and the parameter measures the output elasticity of capital. For the special case in which =, the production function becomes linear in capital thereby giving constant returns to scale: [4] =.
New trade theorists relaxed the assumption of constant returns to scale, and showed that increasing returns can drive trade flows between similar countries, without differences in productivity or factor endowments. With increasing returns to scale, countries that are identical still have an incentive to trade with each other. Industries in ...