Purpose The purpose of this paper was to measure the efficiency of resource utilization across OECD countries aiming to verify that higher levels of competitiveness enhance the production capacity - the maximum possible output of an economy in a given period with the available resources. Design/methodology/approach The author used a two-stage procedure to first estimate the cross-sectional efficiency scores of 18 OECD economies by data envelopment analysis, and then to assess the impact of contextual variables on efficiency running regressions in the second-stage analysis. In particular, in the second stage, the author examined the effects of competitiveness on the production efficiency of the countries, while controlling for other independent variables. Findings The results confirmed that the higher the level of competitiveness, innovation and sophistication factors predominantly, the higher the level of productive efficiency of the countries analyzed. Originality/value The paper is novel because it opens the black box of the aggregate process of production of the conversion of resources into a national product. From the social point of view, it is relevant to know if a country could produce more output with the same resources, such as labor and capital and, therefore, could increase per capita income and social welfare.
