When Did Growth Begin? New Estimates of Productivity Growth in England from 1250 to 1870

Paul Bouscasse, Emi Nakamura and Jon Steinsson

No 28623, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We estimate productivity growth in England from 1250 to 1870. Real wages over this period were heavily influenced by plague-induced swings in the population. Our estimates account for these Malthusian dynamics. We find that productivity growth was zero prior to 1600. Productivity growth began in 1600—almost a century before the Glorious Revolution. Thus, the onset of productivity growth preceded the bourgeois institutional reforms of 17th century England. We estimate productivity growth of 2% per decade between 1600 and 1800, increasing to 5% per decade between 1810 and 1860. Much of the increase in output growth during the Industrial Revolution is explained by structural change—the falling importance of land in production—rather than faster productivity growth. Stagnant real wages in the 18th and early 19th centuries—“Engel’s Pause”—is explained by rapid population growth putting downward pressure on real wages. Yet, feedback from population growth to real wages is sufficiently weak to permit sustained deviations from the “iron law of wages” prior to the Industrial Revolution.

JEL-codes: N13 O11 O47 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff, nep-evo, nep-gro and nep-his
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Working Paper: When Did Growth Begin? New Estimates of Productivity Growth in England from 1250 to 1870 (2025)
Working Paper: When Did Growth Begin? New Estimates of Productivity Growth in England from 1250 to 1870 (2023)
Working Paper: When Did Growth Begin? New Estimates of Productivity Growth in England from 1250 to 1870 (2023)
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