IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/upf/upfgen/495.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Factor prices and productivity growth during the British Industrial Revolution

Author

Listed:
  • Pol Antràs
  • Hans Joachim Voth

Abstract

This paper presents new estimates of total factor productivity growth in Britain for the period 1770–1860. We use the dual technique and argue that the estimates we derive from factor prices are of similar quality to quantity-based calculations. Our results provide further evidence, calculated on the basis of an independent set of sources, that productivity growth during the British Industrial Revolution was relatively slow. The Crafts–Harley view of the Industrial Revolution is thus reinforced. Our preferred estimates suggest a modest acceleration after 1800.

Suggested Citation

  • Pol Antràs & Hans Joachim Voth, 2000. "Factor prices and productivity growth during the British Industrial Revolution," Economics Working Papers 495, Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
    • Handle: RePEc:upf:upfgen:495
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://econ-papers.upf.edu/papers/495.pdf
    File Function: Whole Paper
    Download Restriction: no

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bresnahan, Timothy F. & Trajtenberg, M., 1995. "General purpose technologies 'Engines of growth'?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 65(1), pages 83-108, January.
    2. N. F. R. Crafts & C. K. Harley, 1992. "Output growth and the British industrial revolution: a restatement of the Crafts-Harley view," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 45(4), pages 703-730, November.
    3. Robert J. Barro & Xavier Sala-i-Martin, 1990. "World Real Interest Rates," NBER Chapters,in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1990, Volume 5, pages 15-74 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Collins, William J. & Williamson, Jeffrey G., 2001. "Capital-Goods Prices And Investment, 1870 1950," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 61(01), pages 59-94, March.
    5. Paul A. David & Gavin Wright, "undated". "General Purpose Technologies and Surges in Productivity: Historical Reflections on the Future of the ICT Revolution," Working Papers 99026, Stanford University, Department of Economics.
    6. Feinstein, Charles, 1988. "The Rise and Fall of the Williamson Curve," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 48(03), pages 699-729, September.
    7. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 1984. "Why Was British Growth So Slow During the Industrial Revolution?," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(03), pages 687-712, September.
    8. D. W. Jorgenson & Z. Griliches, 1967. "The Explanation of Productivity Change," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 34(3), pages 249-283.
    9. Charles Feinstein, 1996. "Conjectures and Contrivances: Economic Growth and the Standard of Living in Britain,During the Industrial Revolution," Oxford Economic and Social History Working Papers _009, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    10. C. Knick Harley, 1999. "Cotton textile prices revisited: a response to Cuenca Esteban," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 52(4), pages 756-765, November.
    11. Knick Harley, C & Crafts, Nicholas, 1998. "Productivity of growth during the First Industrial Revolution: inferences from the pattern of British external trade," Economic History Working Papers 22396, London School of Economics and Political Science, Department of Economic History.
    12. Jeremy Greenwood & Boyan Jovanovic, 2001. "Accounting for Growth," NBER Chapters,in: New Developments in Productivity Analysis, pages 179-224 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. C. K. Harley & N. F. R. Crafts, 1995. "Cotton textiles and industrial output growth during the industrial revolution," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 48(1), pages 134-144, February.
    14. N. Gregory Mankiw & David Romer & David N. Weil, 1992. "A Contribution to the Empirics of Economic Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 107(2), pages 407-437.
    15. Javier Cuenca Esteban, 1994. "British textile prices, 1770-1831: are British growth rates worth revising once again?," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 47(1), pages 66-105, February.
    16. Jorgenson, Dale W., 1966. "The Embodiment Hypothesis," Scholarly Articles 3403063, Harvard University Department of Economics.
    17. Julian Hoppit, 1990. "Counting the industrial revolution," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 43(2), pages 173-193, May.
    18. Javier Cuenca Esteban, 1995. "Further evidence of falling prices of cotton cloth, 1768-1816," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 48(1), pages 145-150, February.
    19. Temin, Peter, 1997. "Two Views of the British Industrial Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 57(01), pages 63-82, March.
    20. Clark, Gregory, 1998. "Renting The Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(01), pages 206-210, March.
    21. Dale W. Jorgenson, 1966. "The Embodiment Hypothesis," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 74, pages 1-1.
    22. Chang-Tai Hsieh, 1999. "Productivity Growth and Factor Prices in East Asia," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(2), pages 133-138, May.
    23. Voth, Hans-Joachim, 1998. "Time and Work in Eighteenth-Century London," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(01), pages 29-58, March.
    24. Buchinsky, Moshe & Polak, Ben, 1993. "The Emergence of a National Capital Market in England, 1710–1880," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 53(01), pages 1-24, March.
    25. Harley, C. Knick, 1982. "British Industrialization Before 1841: Evidence of Slower Growth During the Industrial Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 42(02), pages 267-289, June.
    26. Mokyr, Joel, 1987. "Has the industrial revolution been crowded out? Some reflections on Crafts and Williamson," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 293-319, July.
    27. J. E. Stiglitz, 1999. "Introduction," Economic Notes, Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena SpA, vol. 28(3), pages 249-254, November.
    28. David, Paul A, 1990. "The Dynamo and the Computer: An Historical Perspective on the Modern Productivity Paradox," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(2), pages 355-361, May.
    29. Andreas Hornstein & Per Krusell, 1996. "Can Technology Improvements Cause Productivity Slowdowns?," NBER Chapters,in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1996, Volume 11, pages 209-276 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    30. Irwin, Douglas A, 1991. "Terms of Trade and Economic Growth in Nineteenth Century Britain," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(1), pages 93-101, January.
    31. Avinash K. Dixit & Robert S. Pindyck, 1994. "Investment under Uncertainty," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 5474.
    32. McCloskey, Donald N., 1972. "The Enclosure of Open Fields: Preface to a Study of Its Impact on the Efficiency of English Agriculture in the Eighteenth Century," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 32(01), pages 15-35, March.
    33. repec:mes:challe:v:33:y:1990:i:2:p:59-59 is not listed on IDEAS
    34. Lindert, Peter H. & Williamson, Jeffrey G., 1985. "English Workers' Real Wages: Reply to Crafts," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 45(01), pages 145-153, March.
    35. By R.V. JACKSON, 1992. "Rates of industrial growth during the industrial revolution," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 45(1), pages 1-23, February.
    36. Harley, C. Knick & Crafts, N.F.R., 2000. "Simulating the Two Views of the British Industrial Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 60(03), pages 819-841, September.
    37. Chang-Tai Hsieh, 2002. "What Explains the Industrial Revolution in East Asia? Evidence From the Factor Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(3), pages 502-526, June.
    38. Julian Hoppit, 1986. "Financial Crises in Eighteenth-century England," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 39(1), pages 39-58, February.
    39. Maxine Berg & Pat Hudson, 1992. "Rehabilitating the industrial revolution," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 45(1), pages 24-50, February.
    40. Martin Gervais, 1998. "Housing Taxation and Capital Accumulation," UWO Department of Economics Working Papers 9809, University of Western Ontario, Department of Economics.
    41. Feinstein, Charles H., 1998. "Pessimism Perpetuated: Real Wages and the Standard of Living in Britain during and after the Industrial Revolution," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(03), pages 625-658, September.
    42. Michael J. Boskin, 1998. "Consumer Prices, the Consumer Price Index, and the Cost of Living," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 12(1), pages 3-26, Winter.
    43. Chapman, John, 1999. "Charities, Rents, and Enclosure: A Comment on Clark," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 59(02), pages 447-450, June.
    44. Turner, Michael & Beckett, John & Afton, Bethanie, 1998. "Renting The Revolution: A Reply to Clark," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 58(01), pages 211-214, March.
    45. Peter H. Lindert & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 1983. "English Workers’Living Standards During the Industrial Revolution: A New Look," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 36(1), pages 1-25, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mara P. Squicciarini & Nico Voigtländer, 2015. "Human Capital and Industrialization: Evidence from the Age of Enlightenment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 130(4), pages 1825-1883.
    2. Nico Voigtländer & Hans-Joachim Voth, 2006. "Why England? Demographic factors, structural change and physical capital accumulation during the Industrial Revolution," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 11(4), pages 319-361, December.
    3. Posada, Carlos Esteban & Trujillo, Edgar, 2008. "Los precios y el impacto de la industria en el crecimiento económico: los casos inglés (1770-1840) y colombiano (1923-1998)," Revista Lecturas de Economía, Universidad de Antioquia - CIE, November.
    4. Joan R. Rosés & Kevin H. O'Rourke & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2007. "Globalization, Growth and Distribution in Spain 1500-1913," Trinity Economics Papers tep0407, Trinity College Dublin, Department of Economics.
    5. Brunt, Liam & Lerner, Josh & Nicholas, Tom, 2011. "Inducement Prizes and Innovation," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 25/2011, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    6. Bogart, Dan, 2005. "Turnpike trusts and the transportation revolution in 18th century England," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 479-508, October.
    7. Rosés, Joan R. & Prados de la Escosura, Leandro, 2008. "Proximate causes of economic growth in Spain, 1850-2000," IFCS - Working Papers in Economic History.WH wp08-12, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Instituto Figuerola.
    8. Brunt, Liam, 2015. "Weather shocks and English wheat yields, 1690–1871," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 50-58.
    9. Michael Bar & Oksana Leukhina, 2010. "Demographic Transition and Industrial Revolution: A Macroeconomic Investigation," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 13(2), pages 424-451, April.
    10. Mokyr, Joel, 2005. "Long-Term Economic Growth and the History of Technology," Handbook of Economic Growth,in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 17, pages 1113-1180 Elsevier.
    11. Crafts, Nicholas, 2003. "Quantifying the contribution of technological change to economic growth in different eras: a review of the evidence," Economic History Working Papers 22350, London School of Economics and Political Science, Department of Economic History.
    12. Brunt, Liam & Lerner, Josh & Nicholas, Tom, 2008. "Inducement Prizes and Innovation," CEPR Discussion Papers 6917, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    13. Tepper, Alexander & Borowiecki, Karol Jan, 2015. "Accounting for breakout in Britain: The industrial revolution through a Malthusian lens," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 219-233.
    14. Crafts, Nicholas, 2004. "Productivity Growth in the Industrial Revolution: A New Growth Accounting Perspective," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 64(02), pages 521-535, June.
    15. Voigtländer, Nico & Voth, Hans-Joachim, 2009. "The Three Horsemen of Growth: Plague, War and Urbanization in Early Modern Europe," CEPR Discussion Papers 7275, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Feldman, Naomi E. & van der Beek, Karine, 2016. "Skill choice and skill complementarity in eighteenth century England," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 94-113.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    British industrial revolution; productivity growth; dual measurement of productivity;

    JEL classification:

    • N13 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: Pre-1913
    • O47 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence
    • O52 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economywide Country Studies - - - Europe

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:upf:upfgen:495. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (). General contact details of provider: http://www.econ.upf.edu/ .

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.