Convergence of Productivity: Cross-National Studies and Historical Evidence.

• Author: Kendrick, John W.

This volume comprises twelve papers by fifteen authors or co-authors (including the three editors) presented at a conference at New York University in 1992. The conference revolved around the "convergence hypothesis" that asserts that at least since World War II a group of industrial countries was becoming increasingly homogeneous with respect to technology, productivity, and per capita income, and were narrowing the gap with the leader, the United States. The papers were intended to review the evidence concerning selected industries as well as economic aggregates, to discuss tests of the hypothesis, to examine the position of less developed countries (LDCs) in the scenario, and to offer explanations for the observed phenomena.

It is curious that the editors in their Introduction speak of convergence as a hypothesis. In earlier works, the authors of the other three essays in Part I, "General Patterns of Convergence," Angus Maddison, Baumol, and Moses Abramovitz, and other investigators including the present writer, have established the fact of convergence of productivity among the industrialized nations after World War II. But it is good to have the statistical materials updated and the analyses elaborated.

The editors concede that "it is impossible to provide a unified set of conclusions" from the various papers due to their heterogeneity. But I shall indicate the content of the eleven chapters following the Introduction, and a few highlights, to convey the flavor of the collection.

Based on estimates for twenty-one countries beginning in 1820 rising to forty-three since 1950, Maddison provides welcome historical perspective and breadth to the discussion. He notes that the inter- country growth rates varied considerably, with clear divergence of performance in the long run. Yet there was generally convergence in the fourteen "capitalist core" countries, with a good deal of "catch up" with the United States after 1950. There was not much change in variance of growth rates for his other country groupings, except for Asia where divergence rose sharply 1950-89.

Maddison examines the major proximate causes of growth in real income and productivity and concludes ". . . the major engine of growth has been advancing knowledge and technical progress, which needs to be embodied in human and physical capital in order to have an impact" [p. 56].

Baumol also has been concerned with the extent to which there has been convergence over particular time...