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Evidences of Long Swings in the Growth of Swedish Population and Related Economic Variables, 1860–1965

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Maurice Wilkinson
Maurice Wilkinson
Affiliation:
Columbia University
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Extract

This paper presents evidence of long swings in the growth of Swedish population and investigates the question of the possible sources or causes of these demographic movements. I do not have a completely identified model of long swings to offer for empirical testing at this time. It is first necessary to determine the extent to which the long swings are diffused in Sweden and to provide a reliable reference chronology. With this information, the task of seeking the cause and effect relationships can proceed. Nevertheless, an analysis is attempted of the cause and effect relationship underlying Swedish emigration and the interaction of the major economic and demographic variables. In the light of these results, suggestions for further research are offered.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 27 , Issue 1 , March 1967 , pp. 17 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1967

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References

I would like to acknowledge the many helpful comments offered by Ralph Berry, Richard Easterlin, Allen Kelly, and Simon Kuznets on earlier drafts of this paper.

Research support was provided by the Ford Foundation; the Department of Economics, Harvard University; and the Graduate School of Business, Columbia University.

1 Kuznets, Simon, Secular Movements in Production and Prices (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1930)Google Scholar;Burns, Arthur, Production Trends in the United States Since 1870 (New York: National Bureau of Economics Research, 1934)Google Scholar; and Wardwell, C. A. R., An Investigation of Economic Data for Major Cycles (privately published, Philadelphia, 1927)Google Scholar.

2 Riggleman, J. R., “Building Cycles in the United States,” Journal of the American Statistical Association, XXVIII (05 1933)Google Scholar;Long, Clarence D. Jr, Building Cycles and the Theory of Investment (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1940)Google Scholar; Newman, W. H., Building Industry and Building Cycles (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1935)Google Scholar; and Wenzlick, R., “Preliminary Study of National Cycles of Real Estate Activity,” The Real Estate Analyst (10. 1936)Google Scholar.

3 Grebler, Leo, Blanc, David M., and Winnick, Louis, Capital Formation in Residential Real Estate: Trends and Prospects (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956)Google Scholar;Gottlieb, Manuel, “Building and Business Cycles,” Proceedings of the American Statistical Association (12. 1961)Google Scholar;and Abramovitz, Moses, Evidences of Long Swings in Aggregate Construction Since the Civil War, Occasional Paper No. 90 (New York: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1964)Google Scholar.

4 The interested reader is referred to the work of the following authors and the references contained therein: Kuznets, Simon, “Long Swings in the Growth of Population and Related Economic Variables,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society (02. 1958)Google Scholar;Abramovitz, Moses, “The Nature and Significance of Kuznets' Cycles,” Economic Development and Cultural Change, IX (04. 1961)Google Scholar and Evidences of Long Swings; and Easterlin, Richard A., The American Baby-Boom in Historical Perspective, Occasional Paper No. 79 (New York: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1962) and “Economic-Demographic Interactions and Long Swings in Economic Growth” (mimeo, July 31, 1965; forthcoming in American Economic Revieto)Google Scholar.

5 Kuznets, “Long Swings in the Growth of Population.”

6 Ibid.

7 , Easterlin, The American Baby-BoomGoogle Scholar.

8 Wilkinson, Maurice, Swedish Economic Growth (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 1965), ch. iiGoogle Scholar.

9 Ibid., chs. ii and iii.

10 This technique is also to be preferred, since it avoids the possibility that the smoothing technique will “create” cycles in the data from random errors. See Bird, Roger C., Desai, M. J., Enzler, J. J., and Taubman, Paul, “Kuznets' Cycles in Growth Rates: The Meaning,” International Economic Review, VI (05 1965), 237–38Google Scholar.

11 , Easterlin, The American Baby-BoomGoogle Scholar.

12 , Wilkinson, Swedish Economic Growth, ch. iiGoogle Scholar.

13 For data source, see note to Table 1.

14 The eleven highest ranking counties by degree of urban-industrial development are: Stockholm City, Göte. o. Bohus., Mälmohus, Östergötland, Örebo, Västmanland, Uppsala, Gälveborg, Jönkopings, Älvsborg, and Södermanland. See, , Wilkinson, Swedish Economic Growth, ch. iiGoogle Scholar.

15 These data may be forthcoming from a project which I have proposed to the National Science Foundation, “A Regional Econometric Model of Economic and Demographic Change in Sweden, 1860–1965.”

16 Myrdal, Gunnar, “Industrialization and Population,” in Economic Essays in Honor of Gustav Cassel (London: 1933)Google Scholar.

17 , Wilkinson, Swedish Economic Growth, ch. ivGoogle Scholar.

18 Over 80 per cent of the Swedish emigrants moved to the United States.

19 , Easterlin, The American Baby-BoomGoogle Scholar.

20 Douglas C, North, American Economic Growth 1790–1860 (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, 1961)Google Scholar.

21 The literature for Canada and the United States is documented in Watkins, Melville, “A Staple Theory of Economic Growth,” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, XXIX (05 1963)Google Scholar.

22 Fridlizius, Gunnar, “Sweden's Exports 1850–1960,” Economy and History (1963)Google Scholar; Jorberg, Lennart, Growth and Fluctuation of Swedish Industry 1869–1912 (Stockholm: Almquist and Wiksell, 1961)Google Scholar; Hildebrand, K. G., “Sweden,” in Contributions to the First International Conference of Economic History (Paris: Mouton and Co., 1960)Google Scholar; Nurkse, Ragnar, Patterns of Trade and Development, Wiksell Lectures (New York: Oxford University Press, 1961)Google Scholar.

23 , Wilkinson, Swedish Economic Growth, ch. iiiGoogle Scholar.

24 Thomas, Brinley, Migration and Economic Growth (Cambridge, [Eng.]: The University Press, 1954)Google Scholar.

25 “From having taken during the 1840's about 30 percent of the Swedish total exports, the British market expanded very rapidly. When the culmination was reached during the first part of the 1870's, no less than 55 percent of Sweden's total exports went to Grea t Britain.” (Fridlizius, “Sweden's Exports,” p. 21).

26 This section draws heavily on a larger study in progress of intercontinental migration in the nineteenth century (Wilkinson, “The Determinants of European Overseas Migration, 1870–1914,” unpublished paper).

27 Jerome, Harry, Migration and Business Cycles (New York: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1926), p. 208Google Scholar.

28 Easterlin, Richard A., “Economic-Demographic Interactions”; “Influences in European Overseas Emigration before World War I, ” Economic Development and Cultural Change, IX (04. 1961)Google Scholar; and “Long Swings in U.S. Demographic and Economic Growth: Some Fndings on the Historical Pattern” (mimeo, 1966; forthcoming in Demography)Google Scholar.

29 , Easterlin, “Long Swings.i n U.S. Economic and Demographic Growth, p. 11Google Scholar.

30 , Easterlin, The American Baby-Boom, pp. 347–48Google Scholar; and “Long Swings in U.S. Demographic and Economic Growth,” pp. 14–15.

31 My study of European overseas migration, currently in progress, employs, a cross-section analysis to demonstrate this point (Wilkinson, “The Determinants of European Overseas Migration, 1870–1914”).

32 Other factors, of less significance are: cost of transportation; the flow of information from country of destination; and such irregular events as famines, revolution, etc.

33 The t statistic (at 5 per cent level) for each coefficient is in parentheses. The adjusted R2 for the equation is 0.76. There is no evidence of autocorrelation: the Durbin-Watson statistic is 1.71.

34 Koyck, L. M., Distributed Lags and Investment Analysis (Amsterdam: North Holland Publishing Co., 1954)Google Scholar.

35 Frickey, Edwin, Production in the United States 1860–1914 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1947)Google Scholar.

36 See footnote 38.

37 Residential construction in constant prices: Johannson, Osten, Byggnads-Och Analggningsverksmanhaten I Sverige 1861–1955 (mimeo, 1958), Table 17. Railroad construction in kilometers of track:Google ScholarSveriges officiella statistik, Allman jarnvagsstatistik (Stockholm: Statistiska Centralbyran, 1913-1927)Google Scholar.

38 There are three sources of national income estimates available for Sweden: Lindahl, E., Dahlgren, E., and Koch, K., The National Income of Sweden 1861–1930 (Stockholm: P. S. King and Son for the University of Stockholm, 1937)Google Scholar; Lindahl, Olaf, The Gross Domestic Product of Sweden, 1861–1951, Meddelanden Från Konjunkturinstitutet, Serie B:20 (Stockholm: Konjunkturinstitutet, 1956); and Osten Johannson, “Economic Growt h and Structure in Sweden, 1861–1953,” a paper presented to a Conference of the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, Portoroz, Yugoslavia, 1959. The first two sources provide only current value estimates and I have found the deflated series presented by Johannson to be unreliable. Thus I am now in the process of constructing new price deflators to obtain usable deflated national income estimates for the period 1860–1914 (Wilkinson, Swedish Economic Growth 1720–1965, in preparation)Google Scholar.

39 Exports in constant prices: Fridlizius, “Sweden's Exports,” Appendix A, Table 1, pp. 89–91.

40 Cooney, E. W., “Capital Exports and Investment in Britain and the U.S.A. 1865–1914,” Economica, XVI (11. 1949)Google Scholar; Thomas, Brinley, Migration and Economic Growth and “Wales and the Atlantic Economy,” Scottish Journal of Political Economy, VI (11. 1959)Google Scholar; Weber, B., “Index of Residential Construction and Long Cycles in the United Kingdom,” Scottish Journal of Political Economy, II (05 1955);.Google ScholarHabakkuk, John, “Fluctuations in House Building in Britain and the U.S. in the Nineteenth Century,” THE JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC HISTORY, XXII (05 1962)Google Scholar; Kenwood, A. G., “Railway Investment in Britain, 1825–1875,” Economica, XXXII (08. 1965)Google Scholarand “Port Investment in England and Wales,” Yorkshire Bulletin of Economic and Social Research (11. 1965)Google Scholar.