دانلود رایگان مقاله موبایل و سودمندی بیشتر؟ شواهد در سطح بنگاه در مورد اثرات بهره وری استفاده از اینترنت همراه

ABSTRACT

Mobile internet access allows for flexibility with respect to working time and working place. We analyse whether employees' use of mobile internet access improves firms’ labour productivity. Our data set contains 2143 German firms and refers to the year 2014, when high-speed mobile internet was still at a relatively early stage of diffusion within firms. The econometric analysis shows that firms' labour productivity significantly increases with the share of employees with mobile internet access. Our instrumental variables approach suggests that mobile internet use does cause higher labour productivity

6. Conclusions and future research

According to our empirical results, mobile internet use is positively and significantly related with firms' labour productivity. Our instrumental variables estimates suggest that this relationship is indeed causal. The positive aspects of mobile internet, like the improved information flows and the support for a more flexible organisation of work, seem to outweigh the increased difficulty of monitoring the employees or of employees getting distracted because of permanent connectivity. The gains from using mobile internet devices might even increase in the future, as network effects within firms, arising when more and more employees use such devices and access common information bases, might be reinforced. There are various avenues for future research. First, in order to learn more about how mobile internet can improve labour productivity, it is important to know which resources employees have access to when working remotely. Do they have access only to their email accounts or also to data bases and enterprise software? Second, we also know from previous studies that investment in ICT should be accompanied by complementary investment in organisation and human capital in order to be fully utilised (see for example Bresnahan et al., 2002 or Bloom et al., 2012).