 Accounting for the Very LongrunChapter 7 in Economics without Time, 1993, pp 231-269 from Palgrave Macmillan Abstract: Abstract A widely-held view amongst historians, economists, and ecologists is that economic growth – defined in terms of a sustained increase in GDP per capita – is a modern invention. While there are exceptions, the vast majority of scholars, both in the social and natural sciences, take it as read that rapid growth began with the Industrial Revolution, and that any growth before 1700 was very slow, and before 1500 was non-existent.1 The conventional wisdom tells us that economic systems in the distant past experienced, over very long periods of time, either the steady state envisaged by the classical economists, or zero-sum fluctuations in GDP per capita. According to both interpretations, ancient and medieval societies were unable to escape from poverty because they were dominated by custom rather than individual self interest. The implications of such a conclusion are fundamental to our view of the past and future of the human race. Ecologists, for example, believe that just as growth was turned on at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, so it can – indeed must – be turned off again immediately. Keywords: Capita Income; Real Wage; National Income; Industrial Revolution; Economic Change (search for similar items in EconPapers) There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-0-230-37381-5_8 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Palgrave Macmillan Books from Palgrave Macmillan |
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