 The Economic Implications of Learning by DoingChapter 11 in Readings in the Theory of Growth, 1971, pp 131-149 from Palgrave Macmillan Abstract: Abstract It is by now incontrovertible that increases in per capita income cannot be explained simply by increases in the capital-labor ratio. Though doubtless no economist would ever have denied the role of technological change in economic growth, its overwhelming importance relative to capital formation has perhaps only been fully realized with the important empirical studies of Abramovitz [1] and Solow [l 1]. These results do not directly contradict the neo-classical view of the production function as an expression of technological knowledge. All that has to be added is the obvious fact that knowledge is growing in time. Nevertheless a view of economic growth that depends so heavily on an exogenous variable, let alone one so difficult to measure as the quantity of knowledge, is hardly intellectually satisfactory. From a quantitative, empirical point of view, we are left with time as an explanatory variable. Now trend projections, however necessary they may be in practice, are basically a confession of ignorance, and, what is worse from a practical viewpoint, are not policy variables. Keywords: Labor Force; Production Function; Wage Rate; Technical Change; Serial Number (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:978-1-349-15430-2_11 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-15430-2_11 Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Palgrave Macmillan Books from Palgrave Macmillan |
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