Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Economic growth

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Operational research. Game theory

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Most analysts of the modern Latin American economy hold to a pessimistic belief in historical persistence -- they believe that Latin America has always had very high levels of inequality, suggesting it will be hard for modern social policy to create a more egalitarian society. This paper argues that this conclusion is not supported by what little evidence we have. The persistence view is based on an historical literature which has made little or no effort to be comparative. Modern analysts see a more unequal Latin America compared with Asia and the rich post-industrial nations and then assume that this must always have been true. Indeed, some have argued that high inequality appeared very early in the post-conquest Americas, and that this fact supported rent-seeking and anti-growth institutions which help explain the disappointing growth performance we observe there even today. This paper argues to the contrary. Compared with the rest of the world, inequality was not high in pre-conquest 1491, nor was it high in the post-conquest decades following 1492. Indeed, it was not even high in the mid-19th century just prior Latin America's belle époque. It only became high thereafter. Historical persistence in Latin American inequality is a myth.

Zonder onderwerpscode: economie

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

This paper documents industrial output and labor productivity growth around the poor periphery 1870-1940 (Latin America, the European periphery, the Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia). Intensive and extensive industrial growth accelerated there over these seven critical decades. There was an acceleration by the precocious leaders and more poor countries joined their club. Furthermore, many were actually catching up on Germany, the US and the UK. The paper then reports an early effort to identify the sources underlying the spread of the industrial revolution to the poor periphery. Productivity growth certainly made their industries more competitive in home and foreign markets, but other forces may have mattered more. Ever-cheaper labor gave them an edge in labor-intensive industries, increasingly cheap fuel and non-fuel intermediates from globally integrating markets appear to have taken resource advantages away from the European and North American leaders, and real exchange rate depreciation raised the price of import-competing manufactured goods at home. Tariffs helped protect the home market, but more modestly. All of this took place long before the popular post-WWII ISI strategies, especially in Latin America and Russia, where they had their origin.

Zonder onderwerpscode: economie

Choose an application

• Reference Manager
• EndNote
• RefWorks (Direct export to RefWorks)

Most analysts of the modern Latin American economy have held the pessimistic belief in historical persistence -- they believe that Latin America has always had very high levels of inequality, and that it's the Iberian colonists' fault. Thus, modern analysts see today a more unequal Latin America compared with Asia and most rich post-industrial nations and assume that this must always have been true. Indeed, some have argued that high inequality appeared very early in the post-conquest Americas, and that this fact supported rent-seeking and anti-growth institutions which help explain the disappointing growth performance we observe there even today. The recent leveling of inequality in the region since the 1990s seems to have done little to erode that pessimism. It is important, therefore, to stress that this alleged persistence is based on an historical literature which has made little or no effort to be comparative, and it matters. Compared with the rest of the world, inequality was not high in the century following 1492, and it was not even high in the post-independence decades just prior Latin America's belle époque and start with industrialization. It only became high during the commodity boom 1870-1913, by the end of which it had joined the rich country unequal club that included the US and the UK. Latin America only became relatively high between 1913 and the 1970s when it missed the Great Egalitarian Leveling which took place almost everywhere else. That Latin American inequality has its roots in its colonial past is a myth.

Zonder onderwerpscode: economie