quarta-feira, junho 07, 2023

A evolução da produtividade (parte II)


Parte I.

Originalmente a parte II metia Seth Godin e Porter, mas vamos ter de fazer uma alteração.

No passado dia 5 o WSJ publicou um artigo intitulado "Productivity Drop Blurs Economic Picture" de onde sublinho:

"You would think from May's blowout jobs report the economy was booming.

Here's the puzzle: Other recent data suggest it is in recession.

The dichotomy emerges from the divergent behavior of employment and output, two key indicators of economic activity.

...

The economy has gone through periods where output has expanded faster than employment, but seldom the other way around,

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What explains these dissonant signals is productivity, or output per hour worked: It is cratering. That raises questions about whether the much-hyped technology adoption during the pandemic and, more recently, artificial intelligence are making a difference.

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Labor productivity fell 2.1% in the first quarter from the fourth at an annual rate, and was down 0.8% in the first quarter from a vear earlier, the Labor Department said Thursday. That is the fifth-straight quarter of negative vear-over-year productivity growth-the longest such run since records began in 1948.

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Usually, employment plummets during recessions because as factories, offices and restaurants produce less, they need fewer workers. That clearly isn’t happening.

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One reason could be labor hoarding. [Moi ici: LOL. Acho esta explicação tão inverosímil] After struggling to hire and train workers during the pandemic-induced labor crunch, employers are now balking at letting them go, even as sales slip, given the labor market's unusual tightness.

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It's "not that technology got worse in the last year, but that businesses were selling less stuff and they're nervous about their ability to attract employees, so they're holding on to their employees,"

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A more imminent concern is that when workers produce more, companies can raise wages without increasing prices. When productivity falls, it is harder to keep inflation in check."

Ontem durante caminhada matinal li este artigo e tweetei:

Qual é a receita que proponho para o aumento agregado da baixa produtividade portuguesa? Aplicar a receita irlandesa e seduzir empresas de elevado valor acrescentado a estabelecerem-se em Portugal (ver Parte I por exemplo).

Ora o que andam os americanos a fazer? O Financial Times de ontem dá uma ajuda, Gideon Rachman escreveu uma crónica do tempo que passa com o título "How America is reshaping the world economy". Antes de irmos à crónica pensemos por um momento nos fanáticos do Excel quando chegam ao comando das empresas. O que costumam fazer? 

Cortar! Despedir e subcontratar! 

Quanto mais a empresa subcontrata mais a sua produtividade cresce.

Agora voltemos a Gideon:

"An unheralded revolution has taken place in America's approach to international economics. As the new thinking emerges, it is reshaping the global economy and the western alliance.

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The US intends to use a new strategic industrial policy to simultaneously revitalise the American middle-class and US democracy, while combating climate change and establishing a lasting technological lead over China.

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Many of America's allies fear that the bit that slipped off the table was the interests of foreigners. They worry, in particular, that subsidies worth hundreds of billions of dollars to American industry and clean technology, set out in the Inflation Reduction Act, will come at the expense of producers and workers in Europe and Asia."

Volto agora ao tema do artigo no WSJ, o abaixamento da produtividade. A minha tese é que na base desta evolução estará o regresso aos Estados Unidos de produção anteriormente fabricada na Ásia. Produtos de valor acrescentado mais baixo, mas protegidos do mercado do preço pelo mesmo fenómeno que salvou o calçado português,  mas protegidos do mercado do preço pelo medo de uma China que pode invadir Taiwan, mas protegidos do mercado do preço pelos "hundreds of billions of dollars" que subsidiam produções que de outra forma seriam incapazes de competir. Esta produção vem diluir a produtividade anteriormente atingida pela economia americana.

Continua.

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