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Very Short Introductions #282
التاريخ الاقتصادي العالمي: مقدمة قصيرة جدا
ماذا تتمتع بعض دول العالم بالثراء الفاحش ويعاني البعض الآخر الفقر المدقع؟ في هذه المقدمة القصيرة جدًّا، يستكشف روبرت سي آلن تفاعل عوامل الجغرافيا والعولمة والتغيرات التكنولوجية والسياسة الاقتصادية والمؤسسات ليوضح كيف حددت هذه العوامل ثراء وفقر الأمم في جميع أنحاء العالم. وباستخدام أمثلة تاريخية لتحليل العوامل التي أثَّرت على النمو، يميط المؤلف اللثام عن الأسباب التي رسمت ملامح العالم غير المتساوي الذي نحيا فيه اليوم.
للتحميل
http://www.hindawi.org/kalimat/35714749/
للتحميل
http://www.hindawi.org/kalimat/35714749/
179 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2011
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November 24, 2018
كنت بحاول استوعب إيه الأفضلية المقارنة اللي الكاتب بيتكلم عنها دي لحد ما قدرت أخمن في النهاية إنه يقصد القانون الاقتصادي المعروف بالميزة النسبية، المترجم حتى معندوش أدنى معرفة اقتصادية تساعده يترجم صح ولا حتى فكر يدور في ترجمه ومعنى حاجة مشهورة ومهمة اقتصاديًا بالشكل ده!
بخلاف كدة الكتاب عظيم، ومهم جدًا، وبيطرح تفسيرات وإجابات غير معتادة عن السؤال اللي قُتل بحثًا وهو ليه في دول غنية ودول غيرها فقيرة
وأعتقد هحتاج اقراه مرة تانية، أو ارجع له في أجزاء مهمة على الأقل.
من أفضل قراءات 2018
بخلاف كدة الكتاب عظيم، ومهم جدًا، وبيطرح تفسيرات وإجابات غير معتادة عن السؤال اللي قُتل بحثًا وهو ليه في دول غنية ودول غيرها فقيرة
وأعتقد هحتاج اقراه مرة تانية، أو ارجع له في أجزاء مهمة على الأقل.
من أفضل قراءات 2018
March 5, 2018
I had been asked to read this in parallel with Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. Unfortunately, I have gotten around it more than a year late. But I kept the GGS open beside me as I traced the economic explanations for the trajectories of the various continents/regions - and it is true this book is a good companion volume for the enormously popular GGS. It can prove to be a useful aid to go beyond some of the simplistic assumptions and still arrive at some of the same conclusions. Which is a thrill, by the way.
A second reading, and an additional star to Allen's VSI. This really is a superbly concise summation of a lot of great ideas, well tied together and well presented.
A second reading, and an additional star to Allen's VSI. This really is a superbly concise summation of a lot of great ideas, well tied together and well presented.
September 18, 2018
Everybody knows the fight was fixed
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich
That's how it goes…Everybody knows.
—Leonard Cohen
Economics is a frustrating subject, managing to be both essential and eye-wateringly dull. This primer does a decent job of distilling its subject into one basic question – why the world is so unequal – and of holding your attention long enough to sketch the outlines of an answer.
Normally with such things there is a lot of hemming and hawing, bet-hedging, and phrases like ‘remains to be seen’; here, refreshingly, Allen is relatively clear and unambiguous about how things came about (though less so on how they should be fixed). There is much discussion of economic policy, but plainly geographical luck had a lot to do with it – and once some economic development gets underway, it becomes a self-fuelling engine as technology substitutes for, and drives, higher wages.
This is why the technologies developed by the industrialised West can't just be imported into developing countries – they only make economic sense when workers are paid so much that investing in machines instead becomes an appealing prospect.
And the technology brings with it newer, more specialised jobs, which in turn bring higher wages, which in turn prompts further R&D into technology that will make them obsolete…. Hence the Industrial Revolution – and other ‘industrial revolutions’ since – were the result, not just the cause, of high salaries, and countries who don't get started are stuck in a poverty trap.
Especially interesting is the discussion in the last chapter about those few countries that did manage to catch up with the West – namely Japan, South Korea, and in part the Soviet Union. China will undoubtedly join this group any second now. The only way this could be done was to construct all the elements of an advanced industrialised economy all at once – steel mills, car factories, cities, all erected as an act of will on the grounds that they would eventually all need each other. This is ‘big push’ industrialisation, but it is hardly an option for many countries, especially those still suffering the deleterious hangovers of colonialism.
You finish something like this with a lot of questions, but they are at least more specific than the questions you had going in – or that's the hope, anyway. At the very least there's enough in here to arm you against the next Jared Diamond fanatic you find yourself stuck in an elevator with.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich
That's how it goes…Everybody knows.
—Leonard Cohen
Economics is a frustrating subject, managing to be both essential and eye-wateringly dull. This primer does a decent job of distilling its subject into one basic question – why the world is so unequal – and of holding your attention long enough to sketch the outlines of an answer.
Normally with such things there is a lot of hemming and hawing, bet-hedging, and phrases like ‘remains to be seen’; here, refreshingly, Allen is relatively clear and unambiguous about how things came about (though less so on how they should be fixed). There is much discussion of economic policy, but plainly geographical luck had a lot to do with it – and once some economic development gets underway, it becomes a self-fuelling engine as technology substitutes for, and drives, higher wages.
This is why the technologies developed by the industrialised West can't just be imported into developing countries – they only make economic sense when workers are paid so much that investing in machines instead becomes an appealing prospect.
Western technology in the 21st century uses vast amounts of capital per worker. It only pays to substitute that much capital for labour when wages are high relative to capital costs.
And the technology brings with it newer, more specialised jobs, which in turn bring higher wages, which in turn prompts further R&D into technology that will make them obsolete…. Hence the Industrial Revolution – and other ‘industrial revolutions’ since – were the result, not just the cause, of high salaries, and countries who don't get started are stuck in a poverty trap.
Especially interesting is the discussion in the last chapter about those few countries that did manage to catch up with the West – namely Japan, South Korea, and in part the Soviet Union. China will undoubtedly join this group any second now. The only way this could be done was to construct all the elements of an advanced industrialised economy all at once – steel mills, car factories, cities, all erected as an act of will on the grounds that they would eventually all need each other. This is ‘big push’ industrialisation, but it is hardly an option for many countries, especially those still suffering the deleterious hangovers of colonialism.
You finish something like this with a lot of questions, but they are at least more specific than the questions you had going in – or that's the hope, anyway. At the very least there's enough in here to arm you against the next Jared Diamond fanatic you find yourself stuck in an elevator with.
January 2, 2013
This "very short introduction" was fine. One point it hammered home was that there is a historical connection between high wages and growth. That came up repeatedly. Another interesting idea for me was that without the Industrial Revolution, without growth, without, I guess, consumerism, a lot of us would work hard just to subsist. The book gave me a good impression of how various factors interact and why some nations have been more successful than others. Folks, education is much more important than the military. Likewise, giving the so called job creators too big a piece of the pie is good for them in the short term, but not good for long term prosperity. It's bad for everyone in the long term...
December 20, 2022
Very good. Dispassionate longue durée overview of the world's civilizations coupled with assessment of national economic policies. Most discussion goes towards the USSR, Japan and China; I'd have liked to see more on the African attempts at creating industrialized high-wage economies.
High wages and standards of living, in Allen's view, are not so much the result as the cause of economic take-off. Trade union activity captures but does not create high-wage potential. The Industrial Revolution is an umbrella term for a period of adaptation of capitalist enterprise to what was already a high wage environment. In this, Allen almost verbatim repeats Emmanuel's insistence on wage levels as the dynamic variable.
High wages and standards of living, in Allen's view, are not so much the result as the cause of economic take-off. Trade union activity captures but does not create high-wage potential. The Industrial Revolution is an umbrella term for a period of adaptation of capitalist enterprise to what was already a high wage environment. In this, Allen almost verbatim repeats Emmanuel's insistence on wage levels as the dynamic variable.
July 21, 2020
يطرح الكتاب سؤالا هاما ويتناوله بالتحليل: لماذا تتمتع بعض دول العالم بالثراء الفواحش ويعاني البعض الآخر من الفقر المدقع؟
بشكل سريع غير مخل يقف الكاتب على تاريخ الاقتصاد العالمي وأسباب صعود الدول وغناها وفقر البعض الآخر، يمتد تحليل الكاتب من فترة تقع بين 1500:2006 ميلاديا.
كتاب جميل لإلقاء نظرة عامة على مسيرة دول العالم الاقتصادية.
بشكل سريع غير مخل يقف الكاتب على تاريخ الاقتصاد العالمي وأسباب صعود الدول وغناها وفقر البعض الآخر، يمتد تحليل الكاتب من فترة تقع بين 1500:2006 ميلاديا.
كتاب جميل لإلقاء نظرة عامة على مسيرة دول العالم الاقتصادية.
January 29, 2020
This is one of the most remarkable exercises in concision that I have ever encountered, and the style worked rather well for me. I won't try to provide a summary of a text which is itself of an impressively dense summary of the economic history of the last 500 years. I will thus only mention the tidbits that I found interesting.
In the beginning, the main theme is the cause(s) of the Great Divergence: Why did the Industrial Revolution happen in Britain, and not somewhere else? The answer, shortly put, is that labour-saving inventions were incentivised in Britain, more so than anywhere else, due to a combination of high wages and cheap access to coal reserves. Globalisation and state economic policy also played important roles. Colonial exploration and settlement led to an integrated global economy and bigger markets, which made technical innovations even more appealing to European manufacturers.
I especially found the contrast that Allen drew between the British and the French state to be fascinating. Contrary to the imagination of laissez-faire fanatics (and Whig historians), he shows that the British state in the 17th and 18th centuries had, in fact, more authority and engaged in more economic interventions, not less, than its French counterpart. Taxation levels were twice the levels of France, and the doctrine of "Parliamentary Sovereignty" allowed for land appropriations, infrastructure projects and naval expansions (which facilitated British imperialism, thus resulting in economic gains) that simply were not possible in France, due to the influence of the French nobility:
The importance of the Industrial Revolution in shaping the course of human history cannot be understated. The pre-IR world, for the most part, is one in which long-term economic stagnation is the norm. Given this context, Britain's steady GDP growth by ~1.5% between 1760 and 1850 is an extraordinary achievement, one that is mainly made possible by innovations that expand the technological frontier.
Once Britain industrialised, it was only natural for the rest of the world to try and emulate its success. As the first US Secretary of Treasury, Alexander Hamilton developed an economic plan to catch up to the British, leading to the US overtaking Britain by the start of the 20th century. Hamilton's plan, which later influenced German and Japenese policymakers and became the "standard model" for economic growth, rested on four pillars:
1) Creating a unified internal market: Before the ratification of the American Constitution, levying tariffs on other American colonies (later states) was a common practice for American states to raise revenue. Hamilton, a Federalist and a believer in a strong and centralised state, managed to include the "Import-Export Clause" in the Constitution, preventing individual states to impose trade tariffs on each other. This, in conjunction with massive investments in transportation and local infrastructure, created an integrated domestic market in the US.
2) Protecting infant industries from foreign competition: For the majority of the 19th century, the US had some of the highest tariffs on imported manufactured goods in the world. Why? Hamilton was early to recognise the centrality of the establishment of modern manufacturing to economic development, which would not have been possible if British firms, more efficient than their American competitors at the time, were to dominate the American markets. Protectionism provided the American industry much-needed time to mature and import state-of-the-art British technology, without being outcompeted in the meantime. It was only after the end of the Second World War when the US was by far the most advanced economy on the planet, that American policymakers shifted from protectionism to free-trade, as they had very little to fear from global competition by that point.
3) Creating a central banking system to funnel investment and stablise the currency
4) Encouraging mass education: Highly literate and educated citizens are an essential part of any development strategy, as they are key to increasing worker productivity. Almost all innovators have to know reading, writing, and arithmetics, without any of which it would be possible to access the technical literature and/or discuss new discoveries with other innovators and scientists.
For countries that managed to implement all the four aspects of the "standard model" by the 20th century, the results were rather satisfying. But as the wage disparity widened between rich and poor countries, there were even fewer incentives for underdeveloped nations to adopt modern capital-intensive technology; Labour was simply too cheap to make such investments profitable, leading to a vicious cycle of poverty and backwardness. Under these conditions, extensive planning and "big push industralisation" efforts, as Allen puts it, form the winning formula for developing nations. Soviet Union between 1920-1970, post-war Japan, South Korea, and China adopt this approach to account for complementarities between different sectors, managing to close the gap with the industrialised West.
In the beginning, the main theme is the cause(s) of the Great Divergence: Why did the Industrial Revolution happen in Britain, and not somewhere else? The answer, shortly put, is that labour-saving inventions were incentivised in Britain, more so than anywhere else, due to a combination of high wages and cheap access to coal reserves. Globalisation and state economic policy also played important roles. Colonial exploration and settlement led to an integrated global economy and bigger markets, which made technical innovations even more appealing to European manufacturers.
I especially found the contrast that Allen drew between the British and the French state to be fascinating. Contrary to the imagination of laissez-faire fanatics (and Whig historians), he shows that the British state in the 17th and 18th centuries had, in fact, more authority and engaged in more economic interventions, not less, than its French counterpart. Taxation levels were twice the levels of France, and the doctrine of "Parliamentary Sovereignty" allowed for land appropriations, infrastructure projects and naval expansions (which facilitated British imperialism, thus resulting in economic gains) that simply were not possible in France, due to the influence of the French nobility:
Growth was also promoted by Parliament’s power to take people’s property against their wishes. This was not possible in France. Indeed, one could argue that France suffered because property was too secure: profitable irrigation projects were not undertaken in Provence because France had no counterpart to the private acts of the British Parliament that overrode property owners opposed to the enclosure of their land or the construction of canals or turnpikes across it. What the Glorious Revolution meant in practice was that the ‘despotic power’ of the state that ‘was only available intermittently before 1688 … was always available thereafter’.
The importance of the Industrial Revolution in shaping the course of human history cannot be understated. The pre-IR world, for the most part, is one in which long-term economic stagnation is the norm. Given this context, Britain's steady GDP growth by ~1.5% between 1760 and 1850 is an extraordinary achievement, one that is mainly made possible by innovations that expand the technological frontier.
Once Britain industrialised, it was only natural for the rest of the world to try and emulate its success. As the first US Secretary of Treasury, Alexander Hamilton developed an economic plan to catch up to the British, leading to the US overtaking Britain by the start of the 20th century. Hamilton's plan, which later influenced German and Japenese policymakers and became the "standard model" for economic growth, rested on four pillars:
1) Creating a unified internal market: Before the ratification of the American Constitution, levying tariffs on other American colonies (later states) was a common practice for American states to raise revenue. Hamilton, a Federalist and a believer in a strong and centralised state, managed to include the "Import-Export Clause" in the Constitution, preventing individual states to impose trade tariffs on each other. This, in conjunction with massive investments in transportation and local infrastructure, created an integrated domestic market in the US.
2) Protecting infant industries from foreign competition: For the majority of the 19th century, the US had some of the highest tariffs on imported manufactured goods in the world. Why? Hamilton was early to recognise the centrality of the establishment of modern manufacturing to economic development, which would not have been possible if British firms, more efficient than their American competitors at the time, were to dominate the American markets. Protectionism provided the American industry much-needed time to mature and import state-of-the-art British technology, without being outcompeted in the meantime. It was only after the end of the Second World War when the US was by far the most advanced economy on the planet, that American policymakers shifted from protectionism to free-trade, as they had very little to fear from global competition by that point.
3) Creating a central banking system to funnel investment and stablise the currency
4) Encouraging mass education: Highly literate and educated citizens are an essential part of any development strategy, as they are key to increasing worker productivity. Almost all innovators have to know reading, writing, and arithmetics, without any of which it would be possible to access the technical literature and/or discuss new discoveries with other innovators and scientists.
For countries that managed to implement all the four aspects of the "standard model" by the 20th century, the results were rather satisfying. But as the wage disparity widened between rich and poor countries, there were even fewer incentives for underdeveloped nations to adopt modern capital-intensive technology; Labour was simply too cheap to make such investments profitable, leading to a vicious cycle of poverty and backwardness. Under these conditions, extensive planning and "big push industralisation" efforts, as Allen puts it, form the winning formula for developing nations. Soviet Union between 1920-1970, post-war Japan, South Korea, and China adopt this approach to account for complementarities between different sectors, managing to close the gap with the industrialised West.
August 29, 2015
مقدمة قصيرة عن التاريخ الاقتصادي العالمي لكن مفيدة و مثيرة للفكر، لماذا بعض الدول غنية و الأخرى فقيرة؟ لماذا نهضت أوروبا لا إفريقيا؟ أسئلة قدي��ة الإجابة عنها جولة في تاريخ العالم و تحليل لعوامل النمو الاقتصادي ما بين بريطانيا و فترات الاستعمار و قيام أمريكا و نموذج اليابان و روسيا و الفرق بين نموذج التنمية الاقتصادي القياسي و الدفعة القوية �� عوامل النجاح و الفشل لنفس النموذج في دول مختلفة.
أكد الكتاب كثيرا على نقطة أن ارتفاع الأجور يجعل الدول تتجه للتكنولوجيا و بحث تخفيض العمالة فهنا تكون تكلفة رأس المال أقل من تكلفة العمالة و حتى إذا تكلفت الأبحاث أموال طائلة سيكون الأمر مربحا في النهاية و هذا ما حدث في الثورة الصناعية في بريطانيا و في زيادة التصنيع في أمريكا، و يمكن الاستنتاج من ذلك أن في الدول الفقيرة الأجور منخفضة و رأس المال و التكنولوجيا أعلى تكلفة و الأمر غير مربح و اسعار السلع منخفضة لأن العمالة رخيصة و لذلك لا تكفي لشراء آلات غالية الثمن لتحسين الإنتاج و هذه هي دائرة الفقر و التخلف التي تدور فيها الكثير من الدول.
و السلام
أكد الكتاب كثيرا على نقطة أن ارتفاع الأجور يجعل الدول تتجه للتكنولوجيا و بحث تخفيض العمالة فهنا تكون تكلفة رأس المال أقل من تكلفة العمالة و حتى إذا تكلفت الأبحاث أموال طائلة سيكون الأمر مربحا في النهاية و هذا ما حدث في الثورة الصناعية في بريطانيا و في زيادة التصنيع في أمريكا، و يمكن الاستنتاج من ذلك أن في الدول الفقيرة الأجور منخفضة و رأس المال و التكنولوجيا أعلى تكلفة و الأمر غير مربح و اسعار السلع منخفضة لأن العمالة رخيصة و لذلك لا تكفي لشراء آلات غالية الثمن لتحسين الإنتاج و هذه هي دائرة الفقر و التخلف التي تدور فيها الكثير من الدول.
و السلام
October 16, 2025
Good overview/intro into the history of the world economy, but the writing isn't terribly exciting. Still, it was an easy enough read that I might reread it as a refresher.
June 28, 2022
A detailed introduction work on Economic History.
I came to this work through, Angus Maddison on Economic History.
With curious question, "Why did India fall in socio-economic status?"
Once, India was leading nation socio-economically in the planet, So what happened?
There are two popular views:
a) Externalists
b) Internalists
1. What are these?
Externalist blame, completely, english people for India's socio-economic demise.
Internalists blame, social customs, superstition, religious belief within India for socio-economic demise.
As of now; I do not have a full picture.
Engage in a conversation with non-Westerners.
You'd be surprised to find many externalists.
Externalists are armed with an inflexible bow and arrow of flaming words.
Words such as steal, thieves, took away wealth comes fast from this bow and arrow.
They strike our opponent, hitting bulls-eye.
Famous example of externalist view -- Shashi Tharoor.
Tharoor, who struck gold in Politics and at England with externalist view.
2. So, What else?
Did the British steal wealth of India from raw materials?
(or)
Would you care to dig deeper for being honest and truthful?
It is nice to believe Externalists, first glance.
Keep asking questions, be curious.
I am on a journey to seek answer, and invite you to explore,
Start with Angus Maddison's Work.
Angus's work in Allen's writing starts from 1820 - Present for GDP.
We require more data to answer questions
3. Some new terms, I learnt:
High-wage labor market
R&D Investment
Policies
Deus Vult,
Gottfried
I came to this work through, Angus Maddison on Economic History.
With curious question, "Why did India fall in socio-economic status?"
Once, India was leading nation socio-economically in the planet, So what happened?
There are two popular views:
a) Externalists
b) Internalists
1. What are these?
Externalist blame, completely, english people for India's socio-economic demise.
Internalists blame, social customs, superstition, religious belief within India for socio-economic demise.
As of now; I do not have a full picture.
Engage in a conversation with non-Westerners.
You'd be surprised to find many externalists.
Externalists are armed with an inflexible bow and arrow of flaming words.
Words such as steal, thieves, took away wealth comes fast from this bow and arrow.
They strike our opponent, hitting bulls-eye.
Famous example of externalist view -- Shashi Tharoor.
Tharoor, who struck gold in Politics and at England with externalist view.
2. So, What else?
Did the British steal wealth of India from raw materials?
(or)
Would you care to dig deeper for being honest and truthful?
It is nice to believe Externalists, first glance.
Keep asking questions, be curious.
I am on a journey to seek answer, and invite you to explore,
Start with Angus Maddison's Work.
Angus's work in Allen's writing starts from 1820 - Present for GDP.
We require more data to answer questions
3. Some new terms, I learnt:
High-wage labor market
R&D Investment
Policies
Deus Vult,
Gottfried
January 12, 2021
This very short introduction is a good start to economics for students of non-economic fields. It introduces many economic terms, concepts, and theories with lots of quantitative data. It also gives many economic measurements that can be applied individually to analyze the social and economic state of different societies.
I recommend reading this book with "Why Nations Fail" by J. Robinson and D. Acemoglu. Many concepts and processes that are introduced in this short introduction can be found in a more revealed form in the mentioned book.
I recommend reading this book with "Why Nations Fail" by J. Robinson and D. Acemoglu. Many concepts and processes that are introduced in this short introduction can be found in a more revealed form in the mentioned book.
June 12, 2020
ยอมครับ ยอมรับว่ามีประโยชน์ แต่อ่านหลายรอบมากกว่าจะจบ อ่านไปง่วงไป 55555
October 31, 2025
en overraskende god innføring i moderne økonomisk historie!
January 24, 2024
Sorprendentemente interessante!
November 7, 2017
Allen’s writing is clear and the material is fascinating. The central topic is the big divergence, the situation that it emerged from, its causes, the situation after (the ‘big push’) .
One distinctive element of the mercantilist era it’s that it witnessed an early modern globalisation because of the discovery of the New World and new sea routes to East Indies and Americas. This lead to the rise of north-western Europe (Britain, Netherlands, France) and the contemporary relative decline of the Mediterranean region, as well as the accumulation of human capital (knowledge of managerial techniques mainly because of the birth of corporations or joint stock companies such as the East India Company) and the improvement of existing technologies (especially in shipbuilding, weaponry, metallurgy and agriculture).
Data on incomes in the distant past are not robust, but it looks as though the differences in prosperity between countries until 1500 are small, but since the mercantilist era (1500-1800 with the voyages of Columbus and da Gama which led to an integrated global economy thanks to the Atlantic trade) an income gap has resulted from the industrial revolution and then it has expanded creating a divergence between rich and poor countries all throughout 1800s till 1913, as in the former period economic development was to the primary objective – but rather was political power. This changed in the catch-up period of the 19th century when Western Europe and the USA set four policies to close the gap with Great Britain: unification of the domestic market (creation of a unified national market by eliminating internal tariffs and building transportation infrastructure), protectionism (the erection of an external tariff to protect their industries from competition), modernization of banking ( the chartering of banks to stabilize the currency and finance industrial investment), and the establishment of mass education to upgrade the labour force.
Ronald Allen measures this gap through not only GDP per capita but also real wages of unskilled labour, which further proves the poverty trap (when wages decrease people cut back on extras such as education, luxury goods and healthy diet + when labour is cheap, the incentive to increase productivity via capital equipment is minimum-to-non-existent)
In the 20th century, the same policies proved to be less effective in countries that had not yet developed, since technology was not cost effective. There are exceptions to income divergence – Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and later on Soviet Union and China today – all thanks to a degree of planning and coordination of investment (developmental government).
Phenomena that explain this divergence are the shift in world manufacturing distribution and industrialization.
One distinctive element of the mercantilist era it’s that it witnessed an early modern globalisation because of the discovery of the New World and new sea routes to East Indies and Americas. This lead to the rise of north-western Europe (Britain, Netherlands, France) and the contemporary relative decline of the Mediterranean region, as well as the accumulation of human capital (knowledge of managerial techniques mainly because of the birth of corporations or joint stock companies such as the East India Company) and the improvement of existing technologies (especially in shipbuilding, weaponry, metallurgy and agriculture).
Data on incomes in the distant past are not robust, but it looks as though the differences in prosperity between countries until 1500 are small, but since the mercantilist era (1500-1800 with the voyages of Columbus and da Gama which led to an integrated global economy thanks to the Atlantic trade) an income gap has resulted from the industrial revolution and then it has expanded creating a divergence between rich and poor countries all throughout 1800s till 1913, as in the former period economic development was to the primary objective – but rather was political power. This changed in the catch-up period of the 19th century when Western Europe and the USA set four policies to close the gap with Great Britain: unification of the domestic market (creation of a unified national market by eliminating internal tariffs and building transportation infrastructure), protectionism (the erection of an external tariff to protect their industries from competition), modernization of banking ( the chartering of banks to stabilize the currency and finance industrial investment), and the establishment of mass education to upgrade the labour force.
Ronald Allen measures this gap through not only GDP per capita but also real wages of unskilled labour, which further proves the poverty trap (when wages decrease people cut back on extras such as education, luxury goods and healthy diet + when labour is cheap, the incentive to increase productivity via capital equipment is minimum-to-non-existent)
In the 20th century, the same policies proved to be less effective in countries that had not yet developed, since technology was not cost effective. There are exceptions to income divergence – Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and later on Soviet Union and China today – all thanks to a degree of planning and coordination of investment (developmental government).
Phenomena that explain this divergence are the shift in world manufacturing distribution and industrialization.
September 12, 2018
Very interesting book. At least, if you like reading about how countries industrialized, and the theories on how to effectively do so. Allen does a good job of explaining a rather convincing theory that high wages drove investments in high-capital labor saving devices/methods, which forms a positive feedback cycle, as the high-capital devices allow wages to increase, and so higher-capital devices can be introduced economically.
He also gives good accounts of other theories of how economic history such as staples (use a "staple" product to grow by exporting it), and industrial planning.
He tackles every area of the world and pretty much every time from 1500 (mostly focusing on Europe for the early times). Japan, Russia, Korea, Taiwan, and China get special mentions for accomplishing the catch-up of GDP/capita with Western Europe, with some thoughts on how and why.
Overall, just an interesting viewpoint as to how the world has gotten where we gotten. Allen does a good job of pointing out problems with theories and also accepting that no simple explanation will probably due. He ends with "The best policy to effect economic development, therefore, remains very much in dispute," which I think is a fitting ending for an area with so many uncertainties.
He also gives good accounts of other theories of how economic history such as staples (use a "staple" product to grow by exporting it), and industrial planning.
He tackles every area of the world and pretty much every time from 1500 (mostly focusing on Europe for the early times). Japan, Russia, Korea, Taiwan, and China get special mentions for accomplishing the catch-up of GDP/capita with Western Europe, with some thoughts on how and why.
Overall, just an interesting viewpoint as to how the world has gotten where we gotten. Allen does a good job of pointing out problems with theories and also accepting that no simple explanation will probably due. He ends with "The best policy to effect economic development, therefore, remains very much in dispute," which I think is a fitting ending for an area with so many uncertainties.
July 28, 2023
Breve introduzione storico-economica sulle cause della “grande divergenza”. In poco più di 150 pagine Allen analizza il ruolo centrale che la rivoluzione industriale inglese ha avuto sulla crescita economica occidentale e ne esamina le principali cause (geografiche, economiche, politiche e tecnologiche) e conseguenze.
Mi è sembrata un’ottima lettura introduttiva che lascia la voglia di approfondire l’argomento. L’apparato bibliografico fornito e il precedente libro di Allen “La rivoluzione industriale inglese” sono sicuramente le tappe successive.
Mi è sembrata un’ottima lettura introduttiva che lascia la voglia di approfondire l’argomento. L’apparato bibliografico fornito e il precedente libro di Allen “La rivoluzione industriale inglese” sono sicuramente le tappe successive.
November 16, 2015
كتاب جيد مبني على مجموعة من البيانات التي ينهمك في تحليلها طوال الكتاب مجيبًا على تساؤل لماذا هناك دول غنية ودول فقيرة ، مرورًا بالتاريخ الإقتصادي لهذه الدول ، ويصلح لغير المتخصصين.
Read
September 10, 2024i am never taking an econ class again (this was actually pretty great and changed my understanding of the world immensely) (there is still a lot of bigoted and white supremacist rhetoric in it tho)
October 29, 2018
Un percorso, che vede nella scoperta dell'America e nell'età delle grandi esplorazioni l'inizio della globalizzazione (che ha portato il mondo ad essere ciò che è oggi), e che cerca di rispondere a questa sola domanda: perchè esistono paesi ricchi -che possiedono supremazia economica a livello globale- e paesi poveri, che vivono nella miseria e sottostanno al dominio di un economia dettata dall'Occidente che, in passato, li ha distrutti e che tutt'ora continua a farlo? Quand'è iniziata questa grande divergenza?
C'è un grande parallelismo, per la compessità della domanda posta in entrambi i testi, con il saggio di Diamond, 'Armi, acciaio, malattie'.
C'è un grande parallelismo, per la compessità della domanda posta in entrambi i testi, con il saggio di Diamond, 'Armi, acciaio, malattie'.
March 27, 2022
Really great primer, gave me a few interesting leads to track down & orient my limited current knowledge of economic history & development economics within the broader scholarly debate & consensus. One thing I thought it short-changed on was the role of energy in helping spur technological progress and increasing complexity.
March 1, 2022
Robert C. Allen tells us in his introduction to the subject that economic history seeks to explain the nature and causes of national prosperity by examining the process of historical change.
Two essential questions hover above the subject.
First, why did the western Eurasian peninsula and its colonial offshoots diverge in such spectacular fashion from the cyclical Mathulsian limits that had hitherto characterised human history?
Second, how did those few countries that caught up with the West do so?
Trailing those two primary questions are the secondary ones of why the Great Divergence was a regional phenomenon, and why the rest ain’t as rich as the West (+ Japan and the East Asian tigers)?
The book shines when it examines those questions. Vim, vigour, dash, brio! are some of the words that came to mind as I read. In contrast, a rather out of place chapter on Africa is dull, disjointed and flaccid, as literature reviews inevitably are.
In lieu of the antiseptic BCE and CE, consider, instead, B1500 and A1500.
B1500, the wealthiest places on earth—those locations with the greatest concentration of sheer lucre—were the typically Asian empires astride great trading regions and vast metropolises fed by plough-powered, irrigated agriculture. Ming-era China and Mughal India are archetypes. Equally prosperous were city-sized emporia that linked demand and supply across the known world. Venice and Antwerp are justly famous, but there were also places like Alexandria, Ragusa and Dubrovnik.
A1500, things changed. First in the mercantilist phase, c.1500-1800, in a vast burst of expansionary energy, mediaeval European empires like England, Portugal and Spain bound over the Pillars of Hercules into the New World and Asia.
The Americas were settled. They soon exported bullion, tobacco and sugar mined and cultivated by vassalized, enserfed and enslaved Amerindians and Africans. Much of those exports went to Europe, the rest went to Asia. In turn, the Asians traded spices, textiles and porcelain. Those products were circulated across a global market whose shipping, through force, guile and sheer competitiveness, had become a near European monopoly. Note that the Asian exports were industrial products. That becomes important later.
The British beat the Dutch and the French to emerge mistress of the seas in the mercantilist age. She held India, valuable Caribbean isles and an increasing number of naval bases across the world.
While the French, her closest rivals, dallied with revolution, the British mastered a general-purpose technology called steam. By the time Napoleon was cashiered, Britain was in a similar position that her star-spangled descendant would find himself after WW2.
By 1815, Britain was the workshop of the world and London, her greatest city, was becoming the place where British Capital did the world’s business. Britain had made it to the Champions League/The Playoffs while other countries were battling for seeding.
Western Europe and the USA were the first of the rest to make the grade. Their secret sauce was free trade, abolishing tariffs and embracing their comparative advantage.
Kidding.
Instead of those policies, they shifted their comparative advantage.
How?
They unified their national markets via infrastructure and demolished regional barriers, protected their infant industries from British competition, created Central Banks and well-capitalised financial institutions and embraced the mass education of their labour force.
While those future champions had their training montages, British industrial competition ate everyone else up and asked for dessert.
During the reign of Mad King George, the British share of global manufacturing was around 2%. In 1887, when his successor, twice removed, the British Queen-Empress Victoria celebrated her silver jubilee, Britain accounted for at least a quarter of global manufacturing. Unsurprisingly, her jubilee was a time for pomp and circumstance. Perhaps, for all but one. He wrote: ‘For frantic boast and foolish word— Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!’
High wages, adjusted for inflation, Professor Allen writes, was the secret formula that explained the iteration of machine-driven production in Great Britain and, later, the West. To wit: ‘The incentive to increase the amount of machinery used by each worker is greatest where labour is dearest’. In sum, the Industrial Revolution did not cause high wages, it needed them to exist. Now go out, and buy this book.
Two essential questions hover above the subject.
First, why did the western Eurasian peninsula and its colonial offshoots diverge in such spectacular fashion from the cyclical Mathulsian limits that had hitherto characterised human history?
Second, how did those few countries that caught up with the West do so?
Trailing those two primary questions are the secondary ones of why the Great Divergence was a regional phenomenon, and why the rest ain’t as rich as the West (+ Japan and the East Asian tigers)?
The book shines when it examines those questions. Vim, vigour, dash, brio! are some of the words that came to mind as I read. In contrast, a rather out of place chapter on Africa is dull, disjointed and flaccid, as literature reviews inevitably are.
In lieu of the antiseptic BCE and CE, consider, instead, B1500 and A1500.
B1500, the wealthiest places on earth—those locations with the greatest concentration of sheer lucre—were the typically Asian empires astride great trading regions and vast metropolises fed by plough-powered, irrigated agriculture. Ming-era China and Mughal India are archetypes. Equally prosperous were city-sized emporia that linked demand and supply across the known world. Venice and Antwerp are justly famous, but there were also places like Alexandria, Ragusa and Dubrovnik.
A1500, things changed. First in the mercantilist phase, c.1500-1800, in a vast burst of expansionary energy, mediaeval European empires like England, Portugal and Spain bound over the Pillars of Hercules into the New World and Asia.
The Americas were settled. They soon exported bullion, tobacco and sugar mined and cultivated by vassalized, enserfed and enslaved Amerindians and Africans. Much of those exports went to Europe, the rest went to Asia. In turn, the Asians traded spices, textiles and porcelain. Those products were circulated across a global market whose shipping, through force, guile and sheer competitiveness, had become a near European monopoly. Note that the Asian exports were industrial products. That becomes important later.
The British beat the Dutch and the French to emerge mistress of the seas in the mercantilist age. She held India, valuable Caribbean isles and an increasing number of naval bases across the world.
While the French, her closest rivals, dallied with revolution, the British mastered a general-purpose technology called steam. By the time Napoleon was cashiered, Britain was in a similar position that her star-spangled descendant would find himself after WW2.
By 1815, Britain was the workshop of the world and London, her greatest city, was becoming the place where British Capital did the world’s business. Britain had made it to the Champions League/The Playoffs while other countries were battling for seeding.
Western Europe and the USA were the first of the rest to make the grade. Their secret sauce was free trade, abolishing tariffs and embracing their comparative advantage.
Kidding.
Instead of those policies, they shifted their comparative advantage.
How?
They unified their national markets via infrastructure and demolished regional barriers, protected their infant industries from British competition, created Central Banks and well-capitalised financial institutions and embraced the mass education of their labour force.
While those future champions had their training montages, British industrial competition ate everyone else up and asked for dessert.
During the reign of Mad King George, the British share of global manufacturing was around 2%. In 1887, when his successor, twice removed, the British Queen-Empress Victoria celebrated her silver jubilee, Britain accounted for at least a quarter of global manufacturing. Unsurprisingly, her jubilee was a time for pomp and circumstance. Perhaps, for all but one. He wrote: ‘For frantic boast and foolish word— Thy mercy on Thy People, Lord!’
High wages, adjusted for inflation, Professor Allen writes, was the secret formula that explained the iteration of machine-driven production in Great Britain and, later, the West. To wit: ‘The incentive to increase the amount of machinery used by each worker is greatest where labour is dearest’. In sum, the Industrial Revolution did not cause high wages, it needed them to exist. Now go out, and buy this book.
March 5, 2022
**Supremely succinct overview of modern economic history. Allen divides the last 500 years into three periods, the mercantilist era, the catch-up and the big push.**
Leads with the Great Divergence; the period of mercantilism and industrialization, and the discovery of the New World. Large regions of the world are washed into brief overviews, and slavery + colonialism are mostly glossed over. Although, I suppose that is to be expected of a remarkably short and Anglocentric book.
The Industrial Revolution became a turning point in history as it set off the era of sustained economic growth. Why Britain? Britain's high-wage and cheap-energy (due to coal deposits) economy at that time, created profitable conditions for businesses to use technology and capital intensive methods. High wages induced more capital-intensive production that led to even higher wages. Allen provides concise and highly contingent features of industrialisation in Western Europe, and its global impact. Colonialism + Globalisation + Western Technological Superiority led to the de-industrialisation of eastern empires. Western states enjoyed a self-reinforcing and ascending spiral of progress, while today's poor countries missed the elevator.
Allen describes a "Standard model" for economic development in the 19th century; a national market, universal or mass education, protectionist tariffs, advanced banking + financial system. He thinks these four policies were the necessary conditions to industrialise. Nations used these policies to varying degrees of success (expecially Latin American failures). The differences are attributed to geography, demographics and the global landscape at the time.
He briefly examines 'Africa' as a monolith and its failure to industrialise. Finally, he dives into Big Push industrialisation (primarily Russia+ East Asia): mass education, immense production and capital endeavours led by state owned / controlled pushes. These policies guided several nations in the late 20th & 21st centuries onto a pathway to prosperity.
Although several periods aren't given their due, there's limited discussions of different regions, and humdrum repetitions are abound (labour costs and shifts in production methods occupy half the work in the same monotonous manner), the book is an exceptionally concise and informative introduction to a gigantic discipline.
Leads with the Great Divergence; the period of mercantilism and industrialization, and the discovery of the New World. Large regions of the world are washed into brief overviews, and slavery + colonialism are mostly glossed over. Although, I suppose that is to be expected of a remarkably short and Anglocentric book.
The Industrial Revolution became a turning point in history as it set off the era of sustained economic growth. Why Britain? Britain's high-wage and cheap-energy (due to coal deposits) economy at that time, created profitable conditions for businesses to use technology and capital intensive methods. High wages induced more capital-intensive production that led to even higher wages. Allen provides concise and highly contingent features of industrialisation in Western Europe, and its global impact. Colonialism + Globalisation + Western Technological Superiority led to the de-industrialisation of eastern empires. Western states enjoyed a self-reinforcing and ascending spiral of progress, while today's poor countries missed the elevator.
Allen describes a "Standard model" for economic development in the 19th century; a national market, universal or mass education, protectionist tariffs, advanced banking + financial system. He thinks these four policies were the necessary conditions to industrialise. Nations used these policies to varying degrees of success (expecially Latin American failures). The differences are attributed to geography, demographics and the global landscape at the time.
He briefly examines 'Africa' as a monolith and its failure to industrialise. Finally, he dives into Big Push industrialisation (primarily Russia+ East Asia): mass education, immense production and capital endeavours led by state owned / controlled pushes. These policies guided several nations in the late 20th & 21st centuries onto a pathway to prosperity.
Although several periods aren't given their due, there's limited discussions of different regions, and humdrum repetitions are abound (labour costs and shifts in production methods occupy half the work in the same monotonous manner), the book is an exceptionally concise and informative introduction to a gigantic discipline.
September 29, 2014
لماذا بدأت النهضة الإقتصادية من الغرب بالذات ولم تبدأ من أسيا وأفريقيا ؟
سؤال مهم يجيب عنه الكتاب بتفصيل عن طريق قراءة تاريخ الأمم ،
لكني هلخص الأمر في كام نقطة :
-إنجلترا بإعتبارها أكبر قوة عظمى في العالم منذ قرون خلت لم تصعد بمحض الصدفة بل بالإستعمار
وبأخذ ماثقل وزنه أو خف من الدول التي يصعد إقتصادها في ذلك الوقت كالهند مثلا
- أمريكا التي هي في الأصل خليط من بريطانيا وبقية الدول الغربية حذت حذو إنجلترا لكنها تعاملت بعنصرية أكبر وحصرت النمو الإقتصادي على طبقة نخبوية
بعدما همشت السكان الأصليين "الهنود الحمر" وإستعبدت الأمريكين من أصل أفريقي ، وسمح لها تحديد الطبقة الإقتصادية بالتحكم في مسار الأموال إلا أن التمييز جاء عليها بالسلبية أخيراً حتى قررت حظره
- بقية دول أفريقيا عانت من وبال الدولتين أعلاه حيث منع أفرادها من التعليم والعمل الحر والتحكم في المال أو الأراضي ، لدرجة أنه بعد حظر العبودية إستمر أهل البلد الواحد في إستعباد أفراد من قبائل أخرى
بغرض التكسب حيث كان الإقتصاد والتجارة قد تدهورت بالفعل بسبب سيطرة الحكومات الأخرى وتفشي الجهل
- كانت الكلمة السحرية هي "التعليم" حيث إنتبهت إليه الدول الغربية وبدأت في تنميته بشكل أكبر ،حيث كانت الأمية في أمريكا تتجاوز 40% ، ولكن أسيا وأفريقيا تأخرت عن الركب و لم تنتبه له إلا مؤخرا
كما أن الوسائل والأليات المستخدمة في الصناعة والزراعة في الشرق ماهي إلا نتاج الغرب ، وقلة الإبتكار أو الإعتماد على الخامات المتاحة في البيئة هو سبب مهم لتأخر دول أسيا وأفريقيا
- أخيرا اليابان ، كيف تمكنت من النمو مع أنها من ضمن دول أسيا وعليها ما عليهم بالضبط ؟
خلال حكم الإمبراطور توكوجاوا بدأت الحكومة تنتبه إلى أنه لازال هناك وقت ممكن للحاق بالركب ، فألقت العناية الكبرى "للتعليم" بعد أن جاوزت الأمية 60% وكان نصف أفراد البلاد على خط الفقر ، وبقية العناية ألقتها لتشجيع الصناعة حيث تم إنشاء أول مصنع للحديد في عصره وللزراعه نصيب من الدعم
وتم فتح أبواب السوق الحر وتوفير المساحة للمستثمرين وكان الإعتماد الكامل على طاقة المياه والطاقة النظيفة "يعني لا بترول ولا مايحزنون" .. أدت عمليات التنميه إلى إزدهار مبهر بدأ في الثمانينات وظهرت نتائجة في القرن العشرين فقط .
ولو لاحظتم يا سيدات وسادة الرابط المشترك بين كل الإقتصاديات الناجحه : التعليم ، التعليم ، التعليم ..
*كتاب إقتصادي تاريخي مميز ، أنصح به لمن يريد تكوين فكرة شاملة
February 19, 2015
It could have been so much better.
A non-Marxist center-left account. No, that's not quite right. A Listian, Leninist and Preobrazhenskyan history of the world. A history of primitive accumulation and extractive growth.
A critically incomplete account. Provides the outputs of growth, trade, and labor market models, but does not articulate their premises. Offers a dubious account of capital and technology transfer. Offers the conventional (deprecated) account of underdevelopment in the periphery. Dismissive of Smith and the New Institutionalists, and of liberalism more generally.
Begs questions. There's a section that declares that Mexico supplied less education than Americans because Mexicans demanded less education than Americans, and that Mexicans demanded less education than Americans because they had lower consumption expectations than Americans. That's quite a departure from the premises underlying the rest of the book, where labor remains undifferentiated.
Provides aid and comfort to the anti-revisionists. Stalin and Mao get a good press here. Perhaps the most interesting section of the book is its unconventional account of economic development in the People's Republic. According to Allen, the infrastructure, technology, education supply and industrial base established under Mao set the stage for take-off growth after 1978. Institutional and policy change under Deng would have had no effect without that Maoist base.
Includes an excellent bibliography, without a single work by Gregory Clark.
A non-Marxist center-left account. No, that's not quite right. A Listian, Leninist and Preobrazhenskyan history of the world. A history of primitive accumulation and extractive growth.
A critically incomplete account. Provides the outputs of growth, trade, and labor market models, but does not articulate their premises. Offers a dubious account of capital and technology transfer. Offers the conventional (deprecated) account of underdevelopment in the periphery. Dismissive of Smith and the New Institutionalists, and of liberalism more generally.
Begs questions. There's a section that declares that Mexico supplied less education than Americans because Mexicans demanded less education than Americans, and that Mexicans demanded less education than Americans because they had lower consumption expectations than Americans. That's quite a departure from the premises underlying the rest of the book, where labor remains undifferentiated.
Provides aid and comfort to the anti-revisionists. Stalin and Mao get a good press here. Perhaps the most interesting section of the book is its unconventional account of economic development in the People's Republic. According to Allen, the infrastructure, technology, education supply and industrial base established under Mao set the stage for take-off growth after 1978. Institutional and policy change under Deng would have had no effect without that Maoist base.
Includes an excellent bibliography, without a single work by Gregory Clark.
January 26, 2024
Good for explanation with history and econnomic terms
June 16, 2016
The perspectives in this book are not unlike the other history books I have previously read
The main difference is that this is as the title says a lot more concise and to the point
The chapter on Africa is vey interesting and shows how and why Africa has lost out on the development which the other emerging countries were able to build upon
The author is very careful in linking many variables very well through the book
Which includes the education, ago based economy, how and why the Industrial Revolution happened and why it happened and how it affected the world
How the changes in China and the other new emerging countries are affecting the balance of trade and how things might look in the near future based on this
Where is the growth going to be sustainable and why? (Or why not)
Interesting book with a few different perspectives on economic history which is worth reading and considering
Good book
I am considering looking at the other books in the series
The main difference is that this is as the title says a lot more concise and to the point
The chapter on Africa is vey interesting and shows how and why Africa has lost out on the development which the other emerging countries were able to build upon
The author is very careful in linking many variables very well through the book
Which includes the education, ago based economy, how and why the Industrial Revolution happened and why it happened and how it affected the world
How the changes in China and the other new emerging countries are affecting the balance of trade and how things might look in the near future based on this
Where is the growth going to be sustainable and why? (Or why not)
Interesting book with a few different perspectives on economic history which is worth reading and considering
Good book
I am considering looking at the other books in the series
June 25, 2019
ในบรรดาชุดหนังสือความรู้ฉบับพกพา เล่มนี้รู้สึกอ่านเข้าใจง่าย แม้ไม่ได้มีพื้นฐานด้านประวัติศาสตร์ประเทศของบางภูมิภาคมากนัก
หนังสือพยายามเชื่อมโยงปัจจัยที่ส่งผลต่อความเจริญทางเศรษฐกิจของแต่ละประเทศ หรือ ภูมิภาคต่างๆ เช่น
- ในแง่ของภูมิศาสตร์ มีผลทำให้การพัฒนาของอเมริกาเหนือและใต้ต่างกันเพราะอะไร
- ทำไมการปฏิวัติอุตสาหกรรมถึงเกิดขึ้นที่อังกฤษไม่ใช่ฝรั่งเศส หรือ ประเทศอื่นๆในยุโรป
- ทำไมปัจจัยที่เคยส่งผลให้ประเทศนึงประสบความสำเร็จ เมื่อนำมาใช้กับอีกประเทศถึงได้ผลลัพธ์ต่างกัน
- ปัจจัยที่ทำให้ในช่วงที่โลกเริ่มเข้าสู่ยุคสมัยใหม่ช่วงหลัง (ศตวรรษที่19-20) ญี่ปุ่นเป็นประเทศเดียวในเอเชีย สามารถพัฒนาเศรษฐกิจจนยืนหยัดได้เทียบเท่าชาติตะวันตก
- ขั้วอำนาจโลกเปลี่ยนมาเป็นอเมริกาได้อย่างไร
เป็นหนังสือที่ระหว่างอ่านเปิดAtlasไปด้วย สนุกดี กระตุ้นต่อมความอยากรู้ประวัติศาสตร์ประเทศอื่นๆมากขึ้น
หนังสือพยายามเชื่อมโยงปัจจัยที่ส่งผลต่อความเจริญทางเศรษฐกิจของแต่ละประเทศ หรือ ภูมิภาคต่างๆ เช่น
- ในแง่ของภูมิศาสตร์ มีผลทำให้การพัฒนาของอเมริกาเหนือและใต้ต่างกันเพราะอะไร
- ทำไมการปฏิวัติอุตสาหกรรมถึงเกิดขึ้นที่อังกฤษไม่ใช่ฝรั่งเศส หรือ ประเทศอื่นๆในยุโรป
- ทำไมปัจจัยที่เคยส่งผลให้ประเทศนึงประสบความสำเร็จ เมื่อนำมาใช้กับอีกประเทศถึงได้ผลลัพธ์ต่างกัน
- ปัจจัยที่ทำให้ในช่วงที่โลกเริ่มเข้าสู่ยุคสมัยใหม่ช่วงหลัง (ศตวรรษที่19-20) ญี่ปุ่นเป็นประเทศเดียวในเอเชีย สามารถพัฒนาเศรษฐกิจจนยืนหยัดได้เทียบเท่าชาติตะวันตก
- ขั้วอำนาจโลกเปลี่ยนมาเป็นอเมริกาได้อย่างไร
เป็นหนังสือที่ระหว่างอ่านเปิดAtlasไปด้วย สนุกดี กระตุ้นต่อมความอยากรู้ประวัติศาสตร์ประเทศอื่นๆมากขึ้น
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November 3, 2025I want someone to love me the way Bob Allen loves the high wage economy❤️🔥
December 30, 2014
เป็นหนังสือทางเศรษฐศาสตร์ที่ดี และอธิบายสาเหตุต่างๆในทางเศรษฐกิจโลกอย่างน่าสนใจ ตอบคำถามที่ว่าทำไมบางประเทศร่ำรวย บางประเทศยากจนที่สอดคล้องกับปัจจุบันได้ดีมาก
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