The Rhythm of Growth in the Atlantic Economy of the Eighteenth Century

This paper explores the long swings in the economic growth of Great Britain in the eighteenth century on the basis of statistical evidence on foreign trade and construction, including new material on transport investment; and an attempt is made to quantify the process of interaction between Great Britain and the colonial periphery. The questions being asked are inspired by the model which was used to study the dynamics of the Atlantic economy of the nineteenth century. The results indicate that the long swings in construction in Britain up to 1770 were not determined by the occurrence of wars. What the wars did was to influence the late phases of the downswings. As in the nineteenth century, long swings in the building of infrastructure in Britain alternated with long swings in the export sector; the volume of exports and the gross and net barter terms of trade of the colonies moved in the harmony with the long swings in British construction and aggregate demand.