Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T01:19:42.806Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Comparative Productivity in British and German Manufacturing Before World War II: Reconciling Direct Benchmark Estimates and Time Series Projections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 May 2007

Stephen Broadberry  and
Carsten Burhop
Stephen Broadberry
Affiliation:
Professor, Department of Economics, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, United Kingdom Co-ordinator of the Economic History Initiative at the Centre for Economic Policy Research, London. E-mail: [email protected].
Carsten Burhop
Affiliation:
Heisenberg-Fellow, Max-Planck-Institute for Research on Collective Goods, Kurt-Schumacher-Strasse 10, 53113 Bonn, Germany. E-mail: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article provides a new benchmark estimate of comparative Germany/U.K. labor productivity in manufacturing for circa 1907, and experiments with alternative German manufacturing production indices for time series projection from a circa 1935 benchmark. A consistent picture of broadly similar levels of manufacturing labor productivity in Britain and Germany throughout the period 1871–1938 is established. We also show that a substantial German productivity lead had already emerged in heavy industry by 1907, but was offset by a substantial British productivity lead in light industry. For the pre-1914 period, an additional check is provided using nominal income-based estimates.

Type
ARTICLES
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 67 , Issue 2 , June 2007 , pp. 315 - 349
Copyright
© 2007 The Economic History Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Board of Trade. Final Report of the First Census of Production of the United Kingdom (1907). London: HMSO, 1912.
Broadberry Stephen N. “Manufacturing and the Convergence Hypothesis: What the Long Run Data Show.” This JOURNAL 53, no. 4 (1993): 772-95.Google Scholar
Broadberry Stephen N.. The Productivity Race: British Manufacturing in International Perspec-tive, 1870-1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.CrossRef
Broadberry Stephen N.. “How Did the United States and Germany Overtake Britain? A Sectoral Analysis of Comparative Productivity Levels, 1870-1990.” This JOURNAL 58, no. 2 (1998): 375-407.Google Scholar
Broadberry Stephen N.. “Relative Per Capita Income Levels in the United Kingdom and the United States since 1870: Reconciling Time-Series Projections and Direct Benchmark Estimates.” This JOURNAL 63, no. 3 (2003): 852-63.Google Scholar
Broadberry Stephen N., and Rainer Fremdling. “Comparative Productivity in British and German Industry, 1907-37.” Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statis-tics 52, no. 4 (1990): 403-21.Google Scholar
Burhop Carsten, and Guntram B. Wolff. “A Compromise Estimate of German Net National Product, 1851-1913, and its Implications for Growth and Business Cy-cles.” This JOURNAL 65, no. 3 (2005): 613-57.Google Scholar
Chandler Alfred D., Jr. Scale and Scope: The Dynamics of Industrial Capital-ism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1990.
Deane Phyllis, and William A. Cole. British Economic Growth, 1688-1959. (second edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
Dowrick Steve, and Muhammad Akmal. “Contradictory Trends in Global Income Inequality: A Tale of Two Biases.” Review of Income and Wealth 51, no. 2 (2005): 201-29.Google Scholar
Engel Ernst. “Die erwerbstätigen juristischen Personen im preussischen Staate, insbesondere die Aktiengesellschaften.” Zeitschrift des Königlich Preussischen Statistischen Bureaus 15 (1874): 449-536.Google Scholar
Feinstein Charles H. National Income, Expenditure and Output of the United Kingdom, 1855-1965. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972.
Fremdling Rainer. “German National Accounts for the 19th and Early 20th Century: A Critical Assessment.” Vierteljahrschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschafts-geschichte 75, no. 3 (1988): 339-57.Google Scholar
Fremdling Rainer. “Productivity Comparison between Great Britain and Germany, 1855-1913.” Scandinavian Economic History Review 39, no. 1 (1991): 28-42.Google Scholar
Fremdling Rainer, and Reiner Stäglin. “Die Industrieerhebung von 1936: Ein Input-Output Ansatz zur Rekonstruktion der volkswirtschaftliche Gesamtrechnungen für Deutschland im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert - ein Arbeitsbericht.” Vierteljahrschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 90, no. 4 (2003): 416-28.Google Scholar
Fremdling Rainer, and Reiner Stäglin. “Eine Input-Output-Tabelle für 1936 als Grundlage einer neuen volkswirtschaftlichen Gesamtrechnung für Deutschland.” Conference paper, Annual conference of the Verein für Socialpolitik, 2004.
Fremdling Rainer, Herman de Jong, and Marcel Timmer. “British and German Manu-facturing Compared: A New Benchmark for 1935/36 Based on Double Deflated Value Added.” unpublished paper, University of Groningen, 2006.
Gerschenkron Alexander. Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspec-tive. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962.
Heston Alan, Robert Summers, and Bettina Aten. “Price Structures, the Quality Fac-tor, and Chaining.” Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2001. http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/23/40/2425050.pdf.
Hoffmann Walther G. Das Wachstum der deutschen Wirtschaft seit der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts. Berlin: Springer, 1965.
Kaiserliches Statistisches Amt. Statistisches Jahrbuch für das Deutsche Reich 30 (1909).
Kaiserliches Statistisches Amt. “Berufs- und Betriebszählung vom 12. Juni 1907. Gewerbliche Betriebsstatistik.” Statistik des Deutschen Reichs 213 (1910).
Kaiserliches Statistisches Amt. “Ergebnisse der deutschen Produktionserhebungen.” Vierteljahrshefte zur Statistik des Deutschen Reichs 22, no. 3 (1913), Ergänzungsheft.
Kaiserliches Statistisches Amt. “Die Ergebnisse der deutschen Produktionserhebungen.” Vierteljahrshefte zur Statistik des Deutschen Reichs 23, no. 3 (1914): 108-35.
Kendrick John W. Productivity Trends in the United States. Princeton, NJ: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1961.
Krijnse Locker H., and M. D. Faerber. “Space and Time Comparisons of Purchasing Power Parity and Real Values.” Review of Income and Wealth 30, no. 1 (1984): 53-83.Google Scholar
Landes David S. The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Indus-trial Development in Western Europe from 1750 to the Present. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
Maddison Angus. Phases of Capitalist Development. Oxford: Oxford Uni-versity Press, 1982.
Maddison Angus. Dynamic Forces in Capitalist Development: A Long-Run Comparative View. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Maddison Angus. Monitoring the World Economy, 1820-1992. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 1995.
Maddison Angus. The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2001.CrossRef
Nuxoll Daniel A. “Differences in Relative Prices and International Differences in Growth Rates.” American Economic Review 84, no. 5 (1994): 1423-36.Google Scholar
Reichsamt für wehrwirtschaftliche Planung. Die deutsche Industrie - Gesamtergebnisse der amtlichen Produktionsstatistik. Berlin: Verlag für Socialpolitik, Wirtschaft und Statistik Paul Schmidt, 1939.
Ritschl Albrecht. “Spurious Growth in German Output Data, 1913-1938.” European Review of Economic History 8, no. 2 (2004): 201-23.Google Scholar
Rostas Laszlo. Comparative Productivity in British and American Industry. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1948.
Summers Robert, and Alan Heston. “A New Set of International Comparisons of Real Product and Price Levels: Estimates for 130 Countries, 1950-1985.” Review of Income and Wealth 34, no. 1 (1988): 1-25.Google Scholar
Tooze J. Adam. Statistics and the German State, 1900-19145: The Making of Modern Economic Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Ward Marianne, and John Devereux. “Measuring British Decline: Direct Versus Long-Span Income Measures.” This JOURNAL 63, no. 3 (2003): 826-51.Google Scholar
Williams Ernest E. Made in Germany. London: Heinemann, 1896.