The Rise and Fall of American Growth: Exploring the Numbers
American Economic Review
vol. 106,
no. 5, May 2016
(pp. 57-60)
Abstract
This paper reviews some of the major claims in Robert Gordon's Rise and Fall of American Growth. His argument that growth of conventional real GDP per person is well below that of real living standards is accepted. It is shown that adding an imputation to GDP for reductions in mortality raises growth substantially, especially between 1929 and 1950. Gordon is also right that total factor productivity growth peaked in the second and third quarters of the twentieth century but his claim that there was a "great leap forward" in the 1940s, stimulated by World War 2, is not persuasive.Citation
Crafts, Nicholas. 2016. "The Rise and Fall of American Growth: Exploring the Numbers." American Economic Review, 106 (5): 57-60. DOI: 10.1257/aer.p20161070Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- E23 Macroeconomics: Production
- E32 Business Fluctuations; Cycles
- E65 Studies of Particular Policy Episodes
- I31 General Welfare; Well-Being
- N11 Economic History: Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations: U.S.; Canada: Pre-1913
- N12 Economic History: Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations: U.S.; Canada: 1913-
- O47 Empirical Studies of Economic Growth; Aggregate Productivity; Cross-Country Output Convergence