Engines of Sectoral Labor Productivity Growth

We study the origins of labor productivity growth and its differences across sectors. In our model, sectors employ workers of different occupations and various forms of capital, none of which are perfect substitutes, and technology evolves at the sector-factor cell level. Using the model we infer technologies from US data over 1960-2017. We find that sectoral differences in labor productivity growth are largely due to sectoral differences in the growth rate of routine labor augmenting technologies. Neither capital accumulation nor the occupational employment structure within sectors explains much of the sectoral differences in labor productivity growth.