Discussion paper

DP1770 Competition and Firm Performance in Transition Economies: Evidence from Firm Level Surveys in Slovenia, Hungary and Romania

In this paper firm level data are used to test whether competition affects productivity performance in three transition countries, Hungary, Romania and Slovenia. The data are based on interviews taken in more than 300 state-owned, privatized and newly-established private firms between September 1996 and April 1997. The paper finds evidence that long-run competitive pressure has a positive impact on firm performance in Hungary and Slovenia, but not in Romania, while in Romenia short-run competitive pressure has a positive impact on performance. The paper also finds evidence that ownership matters. Traditional firms (being state-owned and privatized enterprises) tend to perform worse than newly-established firms in Hungary and Slovenia. In Romania, the results are somewhat mixed; state-owned enterprises do worse than employee-owned (privatized) and newly-established private firms.

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Citation

Konings, J (1997), ‘DP1770 Competition and Firm Performance in Transition Economies: Evidence from Firm Level Surveys in Slovenia, Hungary and Romania‘, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 1770. CEPR Press, Paris & London. https://cepr.org/publications/dp1770