Endogenous Innovation, Trend Growth, and the British Industrial Revolution: Reply to Greasley and Oxley

1997 ◽  
Vol 57 (4) ◽  
pp. 950-956 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. F. R. Crafts ◽  
Terence C. Mills

David Greasley and Les Oxley provide an interesting but ultimately unconvincing chalenge to the perspective on the British Industrial Revolution that we have set out in recent articles1. We believe that the issues that they raise are important and deserve a full response. Thus, we take the opportunity to clarify ideas on growth theory and its implications for growth accounting, to review the econometrics of estimating trend growth in an economy undergoing structural change, and to reconsider the persuasiveness of different views of the nature of technological change in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Author(s):  
Peter Temin

This chapter reviews the theory of economic growth and the problems of measuring it. It reveals that scholars trying to understand Roman macroeconomics are in far worse shape than economists dealing with more recent economies. A brief survey of some existing research on the level of Roman and Greek income shows that there is a variety of data that could be used to estimate Roman economic growth. An index of human welfare might seem appropriate to indicate the existence and extent of economic growth, but it could be too broad. Another possible measure of economic growth is an index of structural change. The idea of an Industrial Revolution and the place of industry in the economy today suggest that industrialization can be used as a measure of economic growth.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (23) ◽  
pp. 13052
Author(s):  
Marco Bellandi ◽  
Lisa De Propris

The paper is positioned in the emerging debate on the technological change brought about by the Fourth Industrial Revolution, often referred to as Industry 4.0. Our analysis is at the local, sub-national level. The aim is to explore what drivers and barriers local productive systems might face when seeking to embark on transitions that reconcile smart, equitable, and sustainable priorities, under enhanced models called Industry 4.0+. The novelty of the paper is to develop such models by designing a conceptual framework that juxtaposes the drivers and the barriers of sustainability transitions with local productive systems. This novel framework suggests possible pathways that local productive systems can initiate to achieve more equitable and green outcomes for their economy and society by directing the development of digital-related solutions.


Author(s):  
Yelyzaveta Snitko ◽  
Yevheniia Zavhorodnia

The development of a modern economy, in the context of the fourth industrial revolution, is impossible without the accumulation and development of human capital, since the foundation of the transformation of the economic system in an innovative economy is human capital. In this regard, the level of development and the efficiency of using human capital are of paramount importance. This article attempts to assess the role of human capital in the fourth industrial revolution. In the future, human talent will play a much more important role in the production process than capital. However, it will also lead to a greater division of the labor market with a growing gap between low-paid and high-paid jobs, and will contribute to an increase in social tensions. Already today, there is an increase in demand for highly skilled workers, especially in high-income countries, with a decrease in demand for workers with lower skills and lower levels of education. Analysis of labor market trends suggests that the future labor market is a market where there is simultaneously a certain demand for both higher and lower skills and abilities, combined with the devastation of the middle tier. The fourth industrial revolution relies heavily on the concept of human capital and the importance of finding complementarity between human and technology. In assessing the impact of the fourth industrial revolution, the relationship between technology, economic growth and human resources was examined. The analysis was carried out in terms of three concepts of economic growth, technological change and human capital. Human capital contributes to the advancement of new technologies, which makes the concept of human capital an essential factor in technological change. The authors emphasize that the modern economy makes new demands on workers; therefore it is necessary to constantly accumulate human capital, develop it through continuous learning, which will allow the domestic economy to enter the trajectory of sustainable economic growth. The need to create conditions for a comprehensive increase in the level of human capital development is noted.


2003 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 229-236
Author(s):  
Lester H. Myers

The premise of this paper is that agricultural economics, as a distinct subdiscipline of economics, faces perhaps the most serious challenges since struggling for a separate identity nearly a century ago. I fully appreciate the fact that nearly all professional presidential addresses key on the theme of change to one extent or another. However, the environment within which we practice our profession is undergoing such significant transition that I believe radical changes are needed in how we frame and implement our instructional, research, and outreach programs. In his 1986 American Agricultural Economics Association presidential address, Joe Havlicek identified five megatrends affecting agriculture that he believed would have profound implications for our profession: (1) food consumption changes, (2) internationalism and macroeconomic forces, (3) technological change, (4) structural change, and (5) environmentalism.


2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 829-889 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandra de Pleijt ◽  
Alessandro Nuvolari ◽  
Jacob Weisdorf

Abstract We examine the effect of technical change on human capital formation during England's Industrial Revolution. Using the number of steam engines installed by 1800 as a synthetic indicator of technological change and occupational statistics to measure working skills (using HISCLASS), we establish a positive correlation between the use of steam engines and the share of skilled workers at the county level. We use exogenous variation in carboniferous rock strata (containing coal to fuel the engines) to show that the effect was causal. While technological change stimulated the formation of working skills, it had an overall negative effect on the formation of primary education, captured by literacy and school enrolment rates. It also led to higher gender inequality in literacy.


Author(s):  
Önder Nomaler ◽  
Bart Verspagen ◽  
Adriaan van Zon

This chapter addresses the relationship between structural change and the income distribution. It raises the question of whether structural change increases or decreases income inequality. The chapter presents a multi-sectoral model in the so-called canonical modelling tradition. In this model the distributional outcomes depend on the mix of the labour supply in different technology classes and skill biases in technological change. Whether structural change has an effect depends on the specific country. When it does have an effect, it mainly benefits high-skilled labour. The skill premium for high-skilled labour thus contributes to increased income inequality. Both the relative supply of skills and skill-based technological change tend to increase income inequality, though not in all countries.


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