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We analyse TFP growth in the US business sector using a basic unobserved component model where trend growth follows a random walk and the noise is a first order autoregression. [...]

This paper reviews UK supply-side policies since 2010 in terms of their impact on growth and considers medium-term growth prospects in the context of the puzzle of disappointing post-crisis TFP [...]

OECD projections for European countries imply that the crisis will have no long-term effect on trend growth. An historical perspective says this is too optimistic. Not only is the legacy [...]

How public capital, private investment, and taxation are interrelated is investigated in a UK setting, in which a public capital deficit could happen. Increased UK investment in roads and implementation of an efficient national road-pricing scheme are called for. The influence of transport infrastructure to economic productivity in the context of cost-benefit analysis is also discussed.

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jmacro.2007.08.007 Byline: Nicholas Crafts (a), Terence C. Mills (b) Keywords: Malthusian economy; Preventive checks; Positive checks; Homeostasis Abstract: This paper uses a variety of time-series methods and a new real wage series from [Clark, G., 2005. The condition of the working class in England, 1209 to 2004. Journal of Political Economy 113, 520 1307-1340.] to re-examine economic-demographic interactions in pre-industrial England. We confirm that there was a Malthusian economy in the sense that real wages were stationary until the end of the eighteenth century but we find that these was no positive check and that the preventive check broke down in the mid-seventeenth century so that Malthusian controls were absent from that point. There is no evidence of a positive feedback from increasing population size to technological progress as postulated by unified growth theory. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Economics, The University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom (b) Department of Economics, Loughborough University, Loughborough LE11 3TU, United Kingdom Article History: Received 5 March 2007; Accepted 17 August 2007

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2008.00424.x Byline: NICHOLAS CRAFTS (1), TIMOTHY LEUNIG (2), ABAY MULATU (3) Abstract: This paper examines major privately owned British railway companies before the First World War. Quantitative evidence is presented on return on capital employed (ROCE), total factor productivity (TFP) growth, cost inefficiency, and speed of passenger services. There were discrepancies in performance across companies but ROCE and TFP typically fell during our period. Cost inefficiency rose before 1900 but then was brought under control as a profits collapse loomed. Without the discipline of either strong competition or effective regulation, managerial failure was common. This sector is an important qualification to the conventional wisdom that late Victorian Britain did not fail. Author Affiliation: (1)University of Warwick (2)London School of Economics (3)University of Manchester Article History: Date submitted 12 February 2007Accepted30 August 2007

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.eeh.2007.01.002 Byline: Nicholas Crafts (a), Terence C. Mills (b), Abay Mulatu (c) Keywords: Total factor productivity; Railways Abstract: This paper revisits the issue of the productivity performance of Britain's railways with an improved dataset and modern cliometrics. We find a slowdown in TFP growth between 1850 and 1870, after which it stabilized at about 1.1%. An analysis of company-level productivity performance reveals large discrepancies in TFP growth and substantial cost inefficiency. The evidence suggests that there was managerial failure in companies with agency problems in a context of collusion and high entry barriers. A wider implication is that the neoclassical exoneration of late-Victorian British management may be less convincing for the services sector than for manufacturing. Author Affiliation: (a) Department of Economics, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK (b) Department of Economics, Loughborough University, Loughborough, UK (c) School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK Article History: Received 24 January 2005 Article Note: (footnote) [star] Financial support from the Economic and Social Research Council under Grant R000239536 is gratefully acknowledged. We wish to thank Brian Mitchell for generously making available to us his data and Peter Cain for helpful advice. We have benefited from comments by Tony Arnold, Dudley Baines, Steve Broadberry, Terry Gourvish, Peter Howlett, and three anonymous referees. The usual disclaimer applies.

This paper evaluates claims that European productivity growth has been undermined by weak competition and excessive regulation and taxation. The argument has some validity in the context of the information [...]

Implications of industry regulations on productivity of Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development economies are examined.

Measures of market potential for regions of Britain are created by relying on the spacial dispersion of Gross Domestic product and its availability. The peripherality of some of the British regions is discussed in detail.

Research indicates that liberalization of trade has had a generally positive effect on growth for developing countries, but successful capital liberalization relies on high quality of institutions. Geography as a factor in explaining income distribution disparity is also examined.

It has been claimed using the concept of the Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare (ISEW) that there has been an absolute decline in sustainable living standards in the UK since [...]

This article questions lessons learned from East Asia's late 1990s economic crisis, how the crisis will affect East Asia's growth, and whether aspects of East Asia's development model contributed to the crisis.

The advent of the first Industrial Revolution in the UK in the late 18th century and the country's eventual economic decline at the turn of the 19th century can be attributed to a confluence of factors. The Industrial Revolution was driven by technological innovations that allowed the UK to accommodate high population growth rates. However, the country was overtaken by the US in terms of economic growth shortly before the end of the 19th century. UK's economic decline was influenced by market size, supply of scientifically trained labor and other components of growth economics.

The UK industrial revolution that occurred in 1760-1830 can be effectively analyzed by growth economists using models that incorporate total-factor-productivity (TFP) growth. The endogenous-innovation model developed by Young (1993) contains characteristics that complement historical events. However, TFP-based models should not give unnecessary emphasis to research & development issues.

The economic decline experienced by the UK was most noticeable during the 1950s and 1970s. However, a more optimistic assessment of the UK economy was given in the 1980s due to changes in the supply-side policy and apprehensions of its long-run implications. Studies in growth economics have shed light on what went wrong during the 1970s and the implications of what transpired in the 1980s. It was concluded that a limited reversal in the decline may have been due to the Thatcherite reforms in the 1980s. Deindustrialization has been found to be important in itself.

A study examines the impact of transportation costs and the availability of coal on industrial location in Britain. Econometrics is used in the study.

This paper considers the accuracy of traditional TFP growth estimates using a methodology that takes account of scale economies, fixed factors of production and adjustment costs to reveal underlying 'pure technological change'. The results suggest that these biases vary substantially over time but do not impact heavily on Anglo-German comparisons. In both countries the early postwar years are a period when adjustment costs from a rising supply price of capital goods hold down TFP growth below that which could have accrued from pure technological progress. As might be expected, this problem largely disappeared in the later globalisation period.

The reasons behind the slow economic growth, despite innovations during British industrial revolution, are examined.

The contribution of steam to British economic growth in the nineteenth century is estimated using growth accounting methods similar to those recently employed to examine the role of ICT. The results indicate that steam contributed little to growth before 1830 and had its peak impact about a hundred years after Watt's famous invention. Only with the advent of high-pressure steam after 1850 did the technology realise its potential. Compared with ICT, steam's impact on the annual rate of growth was modest. It is unlikely that these conclusions are vulnerable to quantification of hitherto unmeasured TFP spillovers.

It is stated that there are serious problems with the hypothesis that the Victorian climacteric was driven by the decline phase of steam as a General Purpose Technology. The results from the tests conducted proved that the British Growth in the 19th century could not be based mainly on the implications of steam.

There has been a revival of interest in competition policy as a means of promoting productivity performance. Thus, the present government's first competitiveness White Paper asserts that 'competition keeps businesses [...]

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0289.2008.00461_30.x Byline: nicholas crafts (1) Author Affiliation: (1)University of Warwick

These volumes are the output of a remarkably ambitious project by a senior economic historian. First, Lindert undertakes the task of quantifying long term trends in social transfers in OECD [...]

The paper reviews recent UK productivity performance using insights from new growth economics and its embodiment in growth accounting techniques. The sources of the UK labour productivity gap are found to differ across countries; broad capital per worker plays a larger part with regard to France and Germany while innovation matters more compared with the USA. The role of incentive structures is examined and the importance of competition as an antidote to agency problems in UK firms is highlighted. Current UK policy is reviewed and the need to address government as well as market failures is stressed. JEL classification: D24, O47, O52.

Divergence between economies appears more prevalent than convergence, though the human development index shows poorer countries performing in a more encouraging way.