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Chapter 7 - Economic Growth and Productivity

  • Governments also play an essential role in facilitating high rates of private investment spending in an indirect manner.

  • The number of savings and an economy's ability to channel savings into productive investment spending is both determined by the economy's institutions, particularly its financial sector.

  • A well-functioning banking system is particularly crucial for economic growth since it is the primary channel via which savings are funneled into corporate investment spending in most countries.

  • Individuals and private enterprises spend the majority of their money on investments, which is how an economy's physical capital is formed. Government spending on education, on the other hand, accounts for a large portion of an economy's human capital. Although governments cover the majority of the costs of primary and secondary education, individuals are responsible for a large portion of the costs of higher education.

  • Long-term economic growth has been feasible in successful economies like the United States because of good laws, institutions that enforce those laws, and a stable political system that preserves those institutions. So that no one else may remove your stuff, the law must state that it is truly yours.

    GDP per Capita from 1910-2010

  • The courts and the police must be trustworthy in order to avoid being bribed to break the law. Furthermore, the political system must be stable in order for the legislation to not change arbitrarily. These preconditions are taken for granted in the United States, yet they are far from guaranteed. Aside from the disruption produced by war or revolution, many countries discover that corruption has a negative impact on their economic progress.

  • The technologies were created by the Brazilian Enterprise for Agricultural and Livestock Research, a government-run organization. It demonstrated that adding lime and phosphate to cerrado land made it fruitful, as well as developing cattle breeds and soybean kinds adapted to the climate. Brazilian foreign trade regulations, as well as an overvalued exchange rate, hindered exports until the 1980s.

  • Natural resources have historically played a considerably larger role in determining production. The nations with the highest real GDP per capita in the nineteenth century were those with abundant cropland and mineral deposits: the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Australia. As a result, natural resources played a significant role in the evolution of economic theory.

  • The English economist Thomas Malthus used the fixed quantity of land in the globe as the foundation of a gloomy forecast about future productivity in his renowned book An Essay on the Principle of Population, published in 1798. He pointed out that as the population expanded, the quantity of land available per worker would decrease. And, all other things being equal, this would result in a decrease in productivity.

  • In retrospect, the perspective of believing that the advances in technology or increases in physical capital would only provide transitory gains in productivity, as the pressures of the growing population and more employees on land supply would always counteract them. He decided that, in the long term, the vast majority of humanity was doomed to live on the verge of famine. Only then will death rates and birth rates be high enough to prevent population expansion from outpacing productivity growth.

  • Excessive government interference can stifle economic progress even when governments are not corrupt. When major portions of the economy are subsidized, sheltered against imports, or otherwise shielded from competition, productivity suffers as a result of a lack of incentives.

    • The term Depreciation refers to a state that occurs when the value of an asset is reduced by war, age, or obsolescence.

  • The production possibilities curve depicts the various investment and consumer products combinations that Kyland can produce. Everything purchased for household consumption, such as food, clothing, and sporting goods falls under the consumer goods category. All forms of physical capital, that is, products that are used to produce other goods, are considered investment assets.

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Chapter 7 - Economic Growth and Productivity

  • Governments also play an essential role in facilitating high rates of private investment spending in an indirect manner.

  • The number of savings and an economy's ability to channel savings into productive investment spending is both determined by the economy's institutions, particularly its financial sector.

  • A well-functioning banking system is particularly crucial for economic growth since it is the primary channel via which savings are funneled into corporate investment spending in most countries.

  • Individuals and private enterprises spend the majority of their money on investments, which is how an economy's physical capital is formed. Government spending on education, on the other hand, accounts for a large portion of an economy's human capital. Although governments cover the majority of the costs of primary and secondary education, individuals are responsible for a large portion of the costs of higher education.

  • Long-term economic growth has been feasible in successful economies like the United States because of good laws, institutions that enforce those laws, and a stable political system that preserves those institutions. So that no one else may remove your stuff, the law must state that it is truly yours.

    GDP per Capita from 1910-2010

  • The courts and the police must be trustworthy in order to avoid being bribed to break the law. Furthermore, the political system must be stable in order for the legislation to not change arbitrarily. These preconditions are taken for granted in the United States, yet they are far from guaranteed. Aside from the disruption produced by war or revolution, many countries discover that corruption has a negative impact on their economic progress.

  • The technologies were created by the Brazilian Enterprise for Agricultural and Livestock Research, a government-run organization. It demonstrated that adding lime and phosphate to cerrado land made it fruitful, as well as developing cattle breeds and soybean kinds adapted to the climate. Brazilian foreign trade regulations, as well as an overvalued exchange rate, hindered exports until the 1980s.

  • Natural resources have historically played a considerably larger role in determining production. The nations with the highest real GDP per capita in the nineteenth century were those with abundant cropland and mineral deposits: the United States, Canada, Argentina, and Australia. As a result, natural resources played a significant role in the evolution of economic theory.

  • The English economist Thomas Malthus used the fixed quantity of land in the globe as the foundation of a gloomy forecast about future productivity in his renowned book An Essay on the Principle of Population, published in 1798. He pointed out that as the population expanded, the quantity of land available per worker would decrease. And, all other things being equal, this would result in a decrease in productivity.

  • In retrospect, the perspective of believing that the advances in technology or increases in physical capital would only provide transitory gains in productivity, as the pressures of the growing population and more employees on land supply would always counteract them. He decided that, in the long term, the vast majority of humanity was doomed to live on the verge of famine. Only then will death rates and birth rates be high enough to prevent population expansion from outpacing productivity growth.

  • Excessive government interference can stifle economic progress even when governments are not corrupt. When major portions of the economy are subsidized, sheltered against imports, or otherwise shielded from competition, productivity suffers as a result of a lack of incentives.

    • The term Depreciation refers to a state that occurs when the value of an asset is reduced by war, age, or obsolescence.

  • The production possibilities curve depicts the various investment and consumer products combinations that Kyland can produce. Everything purchased for household consumption, such as food, clothing, and sporting goods falls under the consumer goods category. All forms of physical capital, that is, products that are used to produce other goods, are considered investment assets.