Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/35923 
Year of Publication: 
2009
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 4674
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Using U.S. manufacturing data, Griliches (1969) found evidence suggesting that capital equipment was more substitutable for unskilled than skilled labor. Griliches formulated this finding as the capital-skill complementarity hypothesis. The purpose of this study is to determine whether the capital-skill complementarity framework holds for Ghana manufacturing plants in industry and aggregate level. We use an unbalanced panel of plant-level data for manufacturing firms in Ghana during the 1991 and 1997 in four industries (food-bakery, textiles-garments, wood-furniture and metal-machinery). Our findings suggest that capital-skill complementarity holds in aggregate level and wood-furniture sector in Ghana. However, we reject the capital-skill complementarity hypothesis for food-bakery, textile-garment and metal-machinery sectors.
Subjects: 
Capital-skill complementarity
elasticity of substitution
translog cost function
JEL: 
J30
O55
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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