Achieving Scale Collectively. Issue 6 (22nd November 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Bassi, Vittorio; Muoio, Raffaela; Porzio, Tommaso; Sen, Ritwika; Tugume, Esau
• Is Part Of: Econometrica. Volume 90:Issue 6(2022)
• Page Start: 2937
• Page End: 2978
• Publication Date: 2022-11-22
• Subjects: Technology adoption -- mechanization -- small firms -- rental market; Econometrics -- Periodicals; Economics, Mathematical -- Periodicals; Economics -- Periodicals; Économétrie -- Périodiques; Mathématiques économiques -- Périodiques; Économie politique -- Périodiques; 330.05
• DOI: 10.3982/ECTA18773
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0012-9682

Abstract

Abstract : Many firms in developing countries could be too small to adopt modern technology embodied in expensive production machines. This paper shows that rental market interactions allow these small firms to increase their effective scale and mechanize production. We conduct a survey of manufacturing firms in Uganda, which uncovers an active rental market for large machines between small firms in informal clusters. We then build an equilibrium model of firm behavior and estimate it with our data. We find that the rental market is quantitatively important for mechanization and productivity since it provides a workaround for other market imperfections that keep firms small. The rental market also shapes the effectiveness of development policies to foster mechanization, such as subsidies to purchase machines. Overall, our results point to the importance of taking into account firm‐to‐firm interactions within informal clusters to understand technology adoption in low income countries: focusing on the small scale of firms in isolation might be misleading.