Factory Productivity and the Concession System of Incorporation in Late Imperial Russia, 1894–1908

Amanda Gregg

American Economic Review, 2020, vol. 110, issue 2, 401-27

Abstract: In Imperial Russia, incorporation required an expensive special concession, yet over 4,000 Russian firms incorporated before 1914. I identify the characteristics of incorporating firms and measure the productivity gains and growth in machine power enjoyed by corporations using newly-constructed factory-level panel data compiled from Russian factory censuses. Factories owned by corporations were larger, more productive, and more mechanized than unincorporated factories. Higher productivity factories were more likely to incorporate and, after incorporating, added machine power and became even more labor productive. Russian firms sought the corporate form's full set of advantages, not just stock markets access, to obtain scarce long-term financing.

JEL-codes: D24 G31 G32 L60 N43 N63 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

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Working Paper: Factory productivity and the concession system of incorporation in late Imperial Russia, 1894-1908 (2014)
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DOI: 10.1257/aer.20151656

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