The Rise and Fall of American Growth: Exploring the Numbers

Nicholas Crafts

American Economic Review, 2016, vol. 106, issue 5, 57-60

Abstract: This paper reviews some of the major claims in Robert Gordon's Rise and Fall of American Growth. His argument that growth of conventional real GDP per person is well below that of real living standards is accepted. It is shown that adding an imputation to GDP for reductions in mortality raises growth substantially, especially between 1929 and 1950. Gordon is also right that total factor productivity growth peaked in the second and third quarters of the twentieth century but his claim that there was a "great leap forward" in the 1940s, stimulated by World War 2, is not persuasive.

JEL-codes: E23 E32 E65 I31 N11 N12 O47 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
Note: DOI: 10.1257/aer.p20161070
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