Profitability and accumulation in Greek manufacturing

Abstract

This paper examines long-term trends in profitability and capital accumulation for the Greek manufacturing industry from 1955 to 1989, using the growth accounting framework introduced by Weisskopf (1979) and further developed by Glyn et al. (1990). The results show that the overall 7% annual decline in profit rate in Greek manufacturing is attributed primarily to falling profit share and secondarily to falling productivity of capital. The effect of capacity utilization was negligible. The analysis is carried out for different subperiods and the relative importance of each of the constituent components of profitability is evaluated.