From Stagnation in the 30s to Slow Growth in the 70s.

Steindl, Josef

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Document type:: Works

Collection:: Josef Steindl Collection

Title:: From Stagnation in the 30s to Slow Growth in the 70s.: Fassung 2

Author:: Steindl, Josef

Scope:: Typoskript, 24 Blätter, mit zahlreichen Anstreichungen und Anmerkungen

Year of publication:: 1989

Source material date:: [vermutlich um 1989]

Subject:: Wirtschaftsentwicklung Technischer Fortschritt Vollbeschäftigung Stagnation Effective Nachfrage Industrie Kapazitätsauslastung Wettbewerb

Note:: Kopie einer Fassung mit kopierten, ursprünglich handschriftlichen Korrekturen und handschriftlichen Anmerkungen und Anstreichungen. Der vorliegende Text wurde in einer minimal geänderten Fassung zweimal publiziert. In den "Economic Papers" fehlt der einleitende Absatz ("Personal Reminiscenes").

Related work:: Steindl, Josef: From Stagnation in the 30s to Slow Growth in the 70s. In: Steindl, Josef: Economic Papers 1941-88. London: Macmillan, 1990, S. 166-180 Steindl, Josef: From Stagnation in the 30s to Slow Growth in the 70s. In: Berg, Maxine (Hrsg.): Political Economy in the Twentieth Century. New York [u.a.]: Allan, 1990, S. 97-115

Topic:: Growth,cycle and stagnation

JEL Classification:: E32 [Business Fluctuations, Cycles] O11 [Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development]

Shelfmark:: S/M.59.6

Access:: Free access

6 2) The other question I want to deal with is the role of technology. Was not, quite simply, the gradual exhaustion of the railway boom the reason for the decline of accumulation in the 1890s? The role of the railways in the accumulation was no doubt considerable. I cannot of course, uphold the view expressed in my book, that technical progress does not affect the volume of investment. I recanted loruj ago and maintain now, with Kalecki, that technical progress is indeed a stimulant to investment. It would be equally wrong, however, to explain accumulation entirely by the purely exogenous determinant of the rate at which new know how becomes available. The economic climate, created by the ■Mi expansion in the recent past, is of decisive importance for the transformation of know how into innovation. The technological explanation is speciously simple and plausible. There had to be saturation in the case of railways just as there had to be saturation with motor cars more recently, because the high expansion rates of the "build up" period cannot be continued indefinitely. But the question is why other innovations have not been appearing on the scene to take the place of the now saturated one? The technological % or "long wave" see Chris^Freeman^ ) explanations implicitly assume that the dominant innovation ( here the railways ) somehow absorbs so much interest and r resources in capital and management that the alternative opportunities for innovation are neglected. Now it has to be noted that the dominant innovation railroad implied an outstanding development of capital market and organisation, ; W77 leading to the megacorporation ( &^e- Chandler,—Xho vis-iblfc^hand ) in the 1880s, by far the largest business organisations then existing, an oligopolistic organisation designed to protect the industry's profit against ruinous competition.

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