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Productivity growth in the Industrial Revolution: a new growth accounting perspective

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  • Nicholas Crafts

Abstract

The issue of why productivity growth during the British industrial revolution was slow despite the arrival of famous inventions is revisited using a growth accounting methodology based on an endogenous innovation model and the perspective of recent literature on general purpose technologies. The results show that steam had a relatively small and long-delayed impact on productivity growth when benchmarked against later technologies such as electricity or ICT. Even so, technological change including embodiment effects accounted entirely for the acceleration in labor productivity growth that allowed the economy to withstand rapid population growth without a decline in living standards.

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  • Nicholas Crafts, 2002. "Productivity growth in the Industrial Revolution: a new growth accounting perspective," Proceedings, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, issue Nov.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedfpr:y:2002:i:nov:x:1
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    References listed on IDEAS

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