Robert Summers1 1922–2012
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The Death of Welfare Economics: History of a Controversy
A Service of Leibniz-Informationszentrum econstor Wirtschaft Leibniz Information Centre Make Your Publications Visible. zbw for Economics Igersheim, Herrade Working Paper The death of welfare economics: History of a controversy CHOPE Working Paper, No. 2017-03 Provided in Cooperation with: Center for the History of Political Economy at Duke University Suggested Citation: Igersheim, Herrade (2017) : The death of welfare economics: History of a controversy, CHOPE Working Paper, No. 2017-03, Duke University, Center for the History of Political Economy (CHOPE), Durham, NC This Version is available at: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/155466 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Terms of use: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. personal and scholarly purposes. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle You are not to copy documents for public or commercial Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, If the documents have been made available under an Open gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. www.econstor.eu The death of welfare economics: History of a controversy by Herrade Igersheim CHOPE Working Paper No. 2017-03 January 2017 Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2901574 The death of welfare economics: history of a controversy Herrade Igersheim December 15, 2016 Abstract. -
Measuring and Interpreting World Economic Performance 1500-2001
Measuring and Interpreting World Economic Performance 1500-2001 By Angus Maddison © Macro-measurement started in the seventeenth century, but did not emerge as a basic analytical tool for policy analysts and economic historians until the 1940s. In the past 60 years there has been an explosion in the sophistication of policy analysis and the interpretation of history. The explosion started in 1940 with two seminal works: Keynes’ How to Pay for the War which demonstrated its usefulness as a tool of macroeconomic management, and Colin Clark’s Conditions of Economic Progress which demonstrated its value in interpreting economic history. Dissemination and development of techniques of macro-measurement was a major objective of the founding fathers of the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth (IARIW). The initiative came from Simon Kuznets (1901-85), the pioneer of quantitative economic history. Milton Gilbert (1909-79) and Richard Stone (1913-1991) were strategic partners with enormous international leverage in creating and diffusing standard procedures for construction of comparable national accounts by official statistical offices. In the past half-century, I have followed the Kuznetsian approach, augmenting the historical accounts and broadening their geographic scope with my own research, using it to interpret economic performance with a similar analytical toolkit and the same emphasis on transparent description of source material, encouraging graduate students to follow the same path, and creating networks of scholars active in this brand of quantitative economic history. Now we have fairly comprehensive coverage for the whole of the capitalist epoch from 1820 onwards. There are of course gaps in the evidence and scope for improving its quality, but the new challenge, which I have taken up in recent years, is to push the quantitative record further back in time. -
The Scope of Economic Activity in International Income Comparisons
This PDF is a selection from an out-of-print volume from the National Bureau of Economic Research Volume Title: Problems in the International Comparison of Economic Accounts Volume Author/Editor: The Conference on Research in Income and Wealth Volume Publisher: Princeton University Press Volume ISBN: 0-870-14176-7 Volume URL: http://www.nber.org/books/unkn57-2 Publication Date: 1957 Chapter Title: The Scope of Economic Activity in International Income Comparisons Chapter Author: Irving Kravis Chapter URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c2687 Chapter pages in book: (p. 349 - 400) 5.The Scope of Economic Activity in International Income Comparisons IRVING B. KRAVIS UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA Summary THE PURPOSE of this paper is to find a concept of economic activity that will be useful in comparing national incomes in two situations distinguished by widely different social and economic institutions. Interest is focused on interspatial rather than intertemporal insti-. tutional differences and on income comparisons between developed and underdeveloped countries. The view is taken that such com- parisons should be limited to flows of goods obtained through eco- nomic activity in the two situations. This rules out possible com- parisons between the products of a common set of institutions (i.e. the market economy) or between a common list of products. However, it raises fundamental questions regarding the scope of economic activity under different institutional arrangements. Are institutional differences between the developed and under- developed countries so great as to preclude meaningful compari- sons? My analysis of the differences between the two types of economies suggests that significant income comparisons can be made. -
Review of the Oecd-Eurostat Ppp Program
REVIEW OF THE OECD-EUROSTAT PPP PROGRAM TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE KEY CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS.............................................................................. 2 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 3 2. International Volume and Price Comparisons: Needs v. Resources....................................................... 4 3. Reporting of PPP Program Results in OECD Publications..................................................................... 8 (a) National Accounts: Main Aggregates.................................................................................................... 9 (b) Main Economic Indicators .................................................................................................................. 10 (c) OECD Press Release, 19 January 1995 .............................................................................................. 10 (d) OECD in Figures: Statistics on the Member Countries ..................................................................... 11 (e) Communications Outlook .................................................................................................................... 11 4. Expenditure in PPP Dollars v. Real Expenditures ................................................................................ 12 5. PPPs and the National Accounts ......................................................................................................... -
Introduction To" International and Interarea Comparisons of Income
This PDF is a selection from an out-of-print volume from the National Bureau of Economic Research Volume Title: International and Interarea Comparisons of Income, Output, and Prices Volume Author/Editor: Alan Heston and Robert E. Lipsey, editors Volume Publisher: University of Chicago Press Volume ISBN: 0-226-33110-5 Volume URL: http://www.nber.org/books/hest99-1 Publication Date: January 1999 Chapter Title: Introduction to "International and Interarea Comparisons of Income, Output, and Prices" Chapter Author: Alan Heston, Robert E. Lipsey Chapter URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c8384 Chapter pages in book: (p. 1 - 9) Introduction Alan Heston and Robert E. Lipsey Comparisons across countries of prices and of income and output measured in real terms, and comparisons within countries across regions and cities, are an old ambition of economists. The appetite for cross-country comparisons has been attested to by the hundreds of citations of the estimates of real income and prices for many countries constructed by Alan Heston and Robert Sum- mers, now known as the Penn World Tables. Almost the entire recent literature on the determinants of economic growth that covers large numbers of countries is dependent on these data. The Penn World Tables are derived from the UN International Comparison Program (ICP), but few of those who use them know their origin or ever examine the methods underlying the original expenditure and price measures. In organizing this conference, we intended to make the ICP more widely known in the profession; to discuss its problems and new developments, including its extension to the transition economies; to discuss the analogous issues in interarea comparisons; and to illustrate a few of the uses of international and interarea comparisons. -
1 Price Levels, Size, Distribution and Growth of the World Economy
Price Levels, Size, Distribution and Growth of the World Economy: Insights from recent International Comparisons of Prices and Real Product Alan Heston University of Pennsylvania D.S. Prasada Rao The University of Queensland Abstract This paper analyzes the recently released macroeconomic aggregate data from the International Comparison Program (ICP) for the years 2011 and 2017 compiled using comparable and consistent survey methods and aggregation procedures. Focusing on the size of the real world economy, in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, the paper presents estimates of global and regional growth, inflation and exchange rate effects over the period 2011 and 2017. The approach used here has implications for the regular compilation and dissemination of global growth and inflation statistics by organizations like the International Monetary Fund. Growth performance analysis is supplemented with estimates of global and regional inequality. The question about the largest economy is answered using real GDP estimates in PPP terms from the ICP with the conclusion that China and USA were almost at the same level in 2017. Based on the projections to 2019 from the Penn World Table 10.0 and the COVID affected growth rates of these economies in 2020 published by the IMF suggest that China is currently the biggest economy in PPP terms. The paper revisits Balassa and Samuelson in examining a long standing question of interest to economists since the first round of ICP in 1970, namely what determines the price levels measured as the ratio of PPP to exchange rates in different countries. Developing appropriate analytical tools and using macroeconomic aggregate data from the 1975, 2011 and 2017 rounds of the ICP, the paper examines evolution of economic structures of countries in terms of price similarity, the breakdown of services and commodities, and the global price structures. -
International Price Comparisons Based on Purchasing Power Parity
Purchasing Power Parity International price comparisons based on purchasing power parity Because exchange rate movements, in general, tend to be more volatile than changes in national price levels, the purchasing power parity approach provides the proper basis for comparing living standards and examining productivity levels over time Michelle A. Vachris magine you are planning a trip to France and using exchange rates to convert them into a and and would like to figure out how much cur- single currency would not yield an accurate com- James Thomas I rency you will need during your visit. You parison. Again, the comparison based on ex- would need to know how much in French francs change rates does not take into account differ- it would cost for incidentals such as meals, ing prices among the countries. sightseeing, and souvenirs. What information In each of these scenarios, analysts could con- would be helpful to you in making your estimate? struct better estimates if they convert the data You could check the price of, say, a lunch in your into a common currency and value it at the same hometown and then convert that figure into francs price levels. In September 1998, the Organisa- using the exchange rate. This type of estimate tion for Economic Co-operation and Develop- would not be very accurate, however, because it ment (OECD) released price level data and mea- is likely that a lunch in your hometown costs rela- sures for 1996 as a part of the Eurostat-OECD tively more or less than a lunch in France. A bet- purchasing power parity (PPP) program. -
The Death of Welfare Economics: History of a Controversy Herrade Igersheim
The death of welfare economics: history of a controversy Herrade Igersheim To cite this version: Herrade Igersheim. The death of welfare economics: history of a controversy. History of Political Econ- omy, Duke University Press, 2019, 51 (5), pp.827-865. 10.1215/00182702-7803691. hal-03095907 HAL Id: hal-03095907 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03095907 Submitted on 4 Jan 2021 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. The death of welfare economics: history of a controversy Herrade Igersheim Abstract. The death of welfare economics has been declared several times. One of the reasons cited for these plural obituaries is that Kenneth Arrow’s impossibility theorem, as set out in his path-breaking Social Choice and Individual Values in 1951, has shown that the social welfare function – one of the main concepts of the new welfare economics as defined by Abram Bergson (Burk) in 1938 and clarified by Paul Samuelson in the Foundations of Economic Analysis (1947, ch. VIII) – does not exist under reasonable conditions. Indeed, from the very start, Arrow kept asserting that his famous impossibility result has direct and devastating consequences for the Bergson-Samuelson social welfare function (1948, 1950, 1951a, 1963), though he seemed to soften his position in the early eighties. -
Bulletin a Quarterly Bulletin of the International Comparison Program
Volume 5, No. 1, March 2008 BULLETIN A quarterly bulletin of the International Comparison Program In This Issue Cover Stories ........................................ 1 In Praise of PPP Comparisons • In Praise of PPP Comparisons Paul Samuelson, Nobel Laureate, Massachusetts Institute of Technology • Remarks on the ICP Anniversary Thomas Kuhn’s magisterial 1962 Structure of Scientific Revolu- tions justly described how great new revolutionary paradigms can Letter from the Editor .......................... 2 arise to explain previously inexplicable empirical phenomena. Ein- stein’s 1905 theory of special relativity is a good example. Still an- Feature other is Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. • Interview with Alan Heston and Robert As astute physicist Freeman Dyson has pointed out, often a Summers ............................................ 3 different source of scientific resolution can come from discovery Lessons learned of new measuring devices. Copernicus and Kepler could go so far. • What have we learnt from the 2005 ICP But after the telescope was perfected, Galileo and Newton could Round? .............................................. 7 go much farther. Similarly, modern biology and medical practice would not have been • 25 Years of Purchasing Power Parities possible without the discovery of the microscope, x-rays and numerous other scans. in the OECD Area ............................. 11 Although political economy lacks the precision of some of the hard sciences, we • The 2005 ICP has passed its final economists can similarly recognize the pivotal role of new computer hardware and milestones! ......................................... 13 software. As the International Comparison Program (ICP) celebrates its fortieth an- Building Partnerships niversary, I write to praise its pioneers led by the late Irving Kravis of the University • Supporting the ICP: Organizational of Pennsylvania who persisted over many years in estimating purchasing power par- Partnerships ...................................... -
World Bank Document
FILE COPY A Survey and Critique of World Bank Supported Research on International Comparisons of Real Product Public Disclosure Authorized SWP365 World Bank Staff Working Paper No. 365 P.C.C. 1 December 1979 Public Disclosure Authorized Public Disclosure Authorized Prepared by: Robin Marris (Consultant) Economic Analysis & Projections Department Copyright ( 1979 The World Bank 1818 H Street, N.W. Public Disclosure Authorized Washington, D.C. 20433, U.S.A. The views and interpretations in this document are those of the author and should not be attributed to the World Bank, to its affiliated organizations, or to any individual acting in their behalf. Che views and interpretations in this document are those of the author and should not be attributed to the World Bank, to its iffiliated organizations or to any individual acting in their behalf. WORLD BANK Staff Working Paper No.365 December 1979 A SURVEY ANID CRITIQUE OF WORLD BANK SUPPORTED RESEARCH'ON INTERNATIONAL COHPARISONS OF REAL PRODUCT This paper describes the nature and content of the statistical data generated by the project on International Comparisons of Real Product (ICP). It analyzes their theoretical implications, investigates more generally the problems of international comparisons of economic welfare, discusses and criticizes the methods used by the ICP to compare internationally expendi- ture in the services sectors, reconsiders the applied theory of the rela- tionship between price-structure, economic development and purchasing power exchange rates. Prepared by: Robin -
The World Distribution of Well-Being Dissected
This PDF is a selection from an out-of-print volume from the National Bureau of Economic Research Volume Title: International and Interarea Comparisons of Income, Output, and Prices Volume Author/Editor: Alan Heston and Robert E. Lipsey, editors Volume Publisher: University of Chicago Press Volume ISBN: 0-226-33110-5 Volume URL: http://www.nber.org/books/hest99-1 Publication Date: January 1999 Chapter Title: The World Distribution of Well-being Dissected Chapter Author: Robert Summers, Alan Heston Chapter URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c8400 Chapter pages in book: (p. 479 - 508) 16 The World Distribution of Well-being Dissected Robert Summers and Alan Heston This paper will attempt to illuminate the condition of well-being of the 5.5 billion people on earth. More what questions will be addressed here than why questions, but, until we know more than we do, there is plenty of room for a division of labor in dispelling darkness. The arithmetic that follows, in the form of tables and graphs, means and Gini coefficients, frequency distributions and Lorenz curves, etc., is the easy part. Determining which numbers are the relevant ones for the arithmetic is the hard part. Illumination is our modest ob- jective.’ The primary data available for what follows, of greater or less quality, are time series of real gross domestic product (GDP) and its major components for nearly all the countries of the world.* These come from an update of the Penn World Table (PWT), last described in Summers and Heston (1991), Robert Summers is professor of economics at the University of Pennsylvania. -
Imes Discussion Paper Series
IMES DISCUSSION PAPER SERIES WHATEVER HAPPENED TO PRODUCTIVITY INVESTMENT AND GROWTH IN THE G-7? Dale W. JORGENSON and Eric YIP Discussion Paper No. 99-E-11 INSTITUTE FOR MONETARY AND ECONOMIC STUDIES BANK OF JAPAN C.P.O BOX 203 TOKYO 100-8630 JAPAN NOTE: IMES Discussion Paper Series is circulated in order to stimulate discussion and comments. Views expressed in Discussion Paper Series are those of authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Bank of Japan or the Institute for Monetary and Economic Studies. IMES Discussion Paper Series 99-E-11 May 1999 WHATEVER HAPPENED TO PRODUCTIVITY INVESTMENT AND GROWTH IN THE G-7? Dale W. JORGENSON* and Eric YIP** Abstract In this paper we present international comparisons of patterns of economic growth among the G-7 countries over the period 1960-1995. We can rationalize the important changes in economic performance that have taken place among the G-7 countries on the basis of Robert Solow’s neoclassical theory of economic growth. In Section 2 we describe the methodology for allocating the sources of economic growth between investment and productivity. In Section 3 we analyze the role of investment and productivity as sources of growth in the G-7 countries over the 1960-1995. In Section 4 we test the important implication of the neoclassical theory of growth that relative levels of output and input per capita must converge over time. In Section 5 we summarize the conclusions of our study and outline alternative approaches to endogenous growth through broadening the concept of investment. The mechanism for endogenous accumulation of tangible assets captured in Solow’s theory provides the most appropriate point of departure.