THE TERMS OF TRADE FOR COMMODITIES IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Jose Antonio Ocampo and Maria Angela Parra ()
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Jose Antonio Ocampo: United Nations

International Trade from EconWPA

Abstract: This paper looks at the evolution of the terms of trade between commodities and manufactures in the twentieth century. A statistical analysis of the relative price series for 24 commodities and of eight indices reveals a significant deterioration in their barter terms of trade over the course of the twentieth century. This decline was neither continuous, nor was it distributed evenly among individual products, however. The data show that the far-reaching changes that the world economy underwent around 1920 and again around 1980 led to a stepwise deterioration which, over the long term, was reflected in a decline of nearly 1% per year in aggregate real prices for raw materials.

Keywords: Commodity prices; terms of trade (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F12 Q00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his
Date: Written 2004-02-17
Note: Type of Document - pdf; prepared on Win98; to print on ECLAC Review, 79, April 2003; pages: 35; figures: 5
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