This paper surveys the experience of economic growth in the 20th century with a focus on technological change at the frontier together with issues related to success and failure in catch-up growth. A detailed account of growth performance based on historical national accounts data is given and...

A growth accounting methodology is used to compare the contributions to growth in terms of capital-deepening and total factor productivity growth of three general-purpose technologies, namely, steam in Britain during 1780-1860, electricity and information and communications technology in the...

In this paper we examine the persistent effects of past wages of displaced workers on the probability of finding a new job and on wages in the new job. We use a new database looking at the post-displacement experience of a sample of Belgian workers who have lost their jobs because of a sizeable...

This paper surveys the extensive literature on European economic growth since 1950. It presents an overview of comparative growth performance together with benchmarked growth accounting estimates. The growth experience is considered in terms of three periods, the Golden Age of 1950-73, the...

This paper examines growth in output per person in 17 OECD countries from the late nineteenth century to 1989 considering the possibility of several breaks in trend. In all cases the unit root hypothesis is rejected in favour of a segmented trend stationary alternative. 1951-73 is shown to be an...

The Paper considers the accuracy of traditional TFP growth estimates using an econometric methodology which 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...

The paper surveys both the usefulness of endogenous innovation models of growth in economic history and the implications of historical research for new growth theorists. It is suggested that economic historians should take endogenous innovation models seriously and that this will help them to...