Globalization and Growth: Lessons from British Trade Statistics

全球化与增长：英国贸易统计的教训

• 批准号: 0851158
• 负责人: Alan Taylor
• 金额: $ 43.98万
• 依托单位: National Bureau of Economic Research Inc
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-09-01 至 2015-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0851158&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Globalization; Growth; Lessons; British; Trade

This project will investigate the composition and evolution of British trade flows over the years 1700 to 1899. It will do so by constructing a new and highly detailed database of disaggregated imports and exports by commodity and trading partner at ten-year intervals over two centuries, based on a decadal sampling of British customs records. It will then use the data to study theevolution of comparative advantage and its relationship to the long-run economic growth of Britain and its trading partners.INTELLECTUAL MERITThe project will assemble an original data set. The customs records have hitherto been used at a highly aggregate level (sectoral groups) and only for selected (infrequent) sample years. They have never been coded electronically. The data will be more detailed and higher frequency, and this will be vital for systematic empirical analysis of trade and growth models by future researchers.The project will confront open questions about mercantilism in the 18th century. The period of world trade before the Pax Britannica remains shrouded in mystery, especially given the dearth of data. This project will enable researchers to see in more detail shifts in the direction, level, and composition of trade flows, and to see how well modern trade theories apply in an age when military power and imperial aspirations were bound up with commerce. The project will confront open questions about the origins of modern economic growth in the 19th century. The Industrial Revolution remains the key event in economic history, yet our understanding is still incomplete. One important and recurring dispute centers on whether the event was localized in a few sectors or a broad advance. Other controversies surround questionsof how other countries eventually caught up and surpassed Britain, the role of technology and endowments in that process, and how inter- and intra-industry trade evolved during that transition to eventually shape the world economy of today.BROADER IMPACTSIn 1700 Britain was a heavily agrarian power in a mercantilist era. By 1899 Britain was the world's first industrial economy in an age of globalization. The data to be gathered and the analyses to be undertaken will help researchers better understand the emergence of modern economic growth and the role of trade and globalization in that process. The study of that historical process has an intellectual merit of its own, but the investigators also expect to draw lessons from the past for contemporary challenges for economic policymaking in a new era of globalization. Attacking these long-run development questions is also an important goal for the project. Assembling and coding a 200 year span of data from a consistent source will allow the investigators (and future researchers) to confront key causes and consequences of the Great Divergence between rich and poor nations, and the role of trade and comparative advantage in that process.

该项目将调查1700年至1899年英国贸易流量的组成和演变。为此，它将根据英国海关记录的十年抽样，建立一个新的、非常详细的数据库，按商品和贸易伙伴在两个世纪内每十年分列进出口情况。然后，它将使用这些数据来研究比较优势的演变及其与英国及其贸易伙伴的长期经济增长的关系。迄今为止，海关记录的使用是高度综合性的（部门组），而且只用于选定的（不经常的）抽样年份。它们从未被电子编码过。这些数据将更加详细和频繁，这对于未来研究人员对贸易和增长模型进行系统的实证分析至关重要。该项目将面对有关18世纪世纪重商主义的公开问题。大英帝国治下的和平之前的世界贸易时期仍然笼罩在神秘之中，特别是在缺乏数据的情况下。该项目将使研究人员能够更详细地了解贸易流动的方向、水平和构成的变化，并了解现代贸易理论在军事力量和帝国抱负与商业联系在一起的时代的应用情况。该项目将面对有关19世纪世纪现代经济增长起源的公开问题。工业革命仍然是经济史上的关键事件，但我们的理解仍然不完整。一个重要的和反复出现的争议集中在事件是否局限于少数部门或广泛的进步。其他的争议围绕着其他国家如何最终赶上并超越英国，技术和禀赋在这一过程中的作用，以及产业间和产业内贸易如何在这一转变过程中演变并最终塑造了今天的世界经济。更广泛的影响1700年，英国是一个重农主义时代的大国。到1899年，英国成为全球化时代世界上第一个工业经济体。将要收集的数据和将要进行的分析将有助于研究人员更好地了解现代经济增长的出现以及贸易和全球化在这一进程中的作用。对这一历史进程的研究有其自身的学术价值，但研究人员也希望从过去吸取教训，以应对全球化新时代经济政策制定的当代挑战。解决这些长期发展问题也是该项目的一个重要目标。从一致的来源收集和编码200年的数据将使调查人员（和未来的研究人员）能够面对富国和穷国之间的大分化的关键原因和后果，以及贸易和比较优势在这一过程中的作用。