Made in America? The New World, the Old, and the Industrial Revolution

De volta aos temas de ontem:
Made in America? The New World, the Old, and the Industrial Revolution
by Gregory Clark, Kevin H. O'Rourke, Alan M. Taylor - #14077 (DAE IFM ITI)

Abstract:

For two decades, the consensus explanation of the British Industrial
Revolution has placed technological change and the supply side at
center stage, affording little or no role for demand or overseas
trade. Recently, alternative explanations have placed an emphasis on
the importance of trade with New World colonies, and the expanded
supply of raw cotton it provided. We test both hypotheses using
calibrated general equilibrium models of the British economy and the
rest of the world for 1760 and 1850. Neither claim is supported.
Trade was vital for the progress of the industrial revolution; but it
was trade with the rest of the world, not the American colonies, that
allowed Britain to export its rapidly expanding textile output and
achieve growth through extreme specialization in response to shifting
comparative advantage.