Productivity Growth in Transportation

From 1990 to 2000, labor productivity rose in all transportation modes, but only exceeded the productivity growth rate for the overall economy in three – railroads, local trucking, and pipelines. From 1990 to 1999, rail transportation experienced a substantially higher growth of multifactor productivity than did the private business sector. Increases in multifactor productivity in rail transportation have been affected by improvements in capital inputs (e.g., equipment investments) and changes in the organization of service delivery.