Author(s)

Xingwu Zheng^*, Yi Zhang, Wei Lu

College of Economics and Management, Civil Aviation University of China, Tianjin, China.

China’s civil aviation industry experienced an average annual growth rate of over 16% for traffic turnover during 1955-2011. It is important to identify the role of capital and labor inputs as well as total factor productivity (TFP) in China’s civil aviation industry during this period of time. First, the inputs of capital stock and labor as well as the output of traffic turnover in China’s air transport industry are measured. Next, the constrained E-G two-stage estimation of the CD production function is used to calculate the capital and labor elasticities and TFP, which provides the necessary basis for the estimation of the growth sources in China’s air transport industry from 1955 to 2011. The results show that the growth of China’s civil aviation industry has depended on the capital factor input and that TFP has played an increasingly important role. Furthermore, the results also indicate that private sources have been crucial for improving the TFP after the 2002 reform.

China’s Civil Aviation Industry, Growth Sources, TFP, Capital Stock, Labor

Zheng, X. , Zhang, Y. and Lu, W. (2016) What Supported the Growth of China’s Air Transport Industry from 1955 to 2011?. Theoretical Economics Letters, 6, 48-58. doi: 10.4236/tel.2016.61007.