Are Dutch Services Industries Becoming More Productive? Explorations on Micro-data

Statistics Netherlands is planning to set up a system of productivity statistics. An innovative approach is to directly build up productivity indices from data at the level of the individual firm. To study the feasibility of this approach, several exercises have been carried out, using micro-data on trade services, transport services and business services. It will be shown how sensitive productivity indices are with respect to the method. Some recommendations about the method will be given.