Applying History to Inform Anticipatory AI Governance: Using Foresight and Hindsight to Inform Policymaking
Summary: Artificial intelligence (AI) heralds societal changes that could rival those associated with past transformational general-purpose technologies, such as metallurgy, the steam engine, electricity, and the internet. As with such technologies, AI offers the opportunity for tremendous increases in human well-being while also threatening to destabilize social, governance, economic, and critical infrastructure systems and disempower […]
Reversing fortunes of German regions, 1926–2019: Boon and bane of early industrialization?
Abstract: This paper shows that nineteenth-century industrialization is an essential determinant of the pronounced changes in economic prosperity across German regions over the last 100 years. Using novel data on economic activity in 163 labor market regions in West Germany, we find that nearly half of them experienced a reversal of fortune, moving from the […]
Irish GDP Since Independence
Abstract: This paper constructs annual GDP estimates for Ireland (1924-47) to join the first complete official aggregates. The new series is deployed to revisit Ireland’s economic performance in the post-independence decades. Ireland’s economy grew at 1.5 per cent per annum and average living standards improved by 40 per cent. The bulk of this was due […]
What can we learn about patents and innovation from the past?
Abstract: The history of industrial revolutions provides valuable insights into how patents and patenting systems influence innovation. It also reveals the extent to which inventors have relied on other ways to protect their ideas, including secrecy, sharing and showcasing them at international exhibitions. Cite as: Stephen Billington, Alan Hanna, Joe Lane, What can we learn […]
‘Clause and effect’: Invention and state intervention during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
Abstract: Did the outbreak of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars influence technical change during the Industrial Revolution? We address this question by investigating an instance of state intervention into the market for inventions from 1793-1820: the introduction of a new proviso into British patents compelling inventors to supply the military, and also attracting military […]
Failing to level up? Industrial policy and productivity in interwar Northern Ireland
Abstract: Northern Ireland’s productivity performance has persistently been the worst of any UK region. This is despite having the apparent benefit of subnational industrial policy since the 1920s. Can institutions – through the interaction between business and local policymakers – explain this longstanding productivity gap? Existing literature focuses on post-war policy in Northern Ireland, but […]
Sticky wages and the Great Depression: evidence from the United Kingdom
Abstract: How sticky were wages during the Great Depression? Although classic accounts emphasise the importance of nominal rigidity in amplifying deflationary shocks, the evidence is limited. In this paper, I calculate the degree of nominal wage rigidity in the United Kingdom between the wars using new granular data covering millions of wages. I find that […]
An annual index of Irish industrial production, 1800-1913
Abstract: We assemble the Irish industrial data currently available for the years 1800–1921, the period during which the entire island was in a political union with Great Britain, and construct an annual index of Irish industrial output for 1800–1913. We also construct a new industrial price index. Irish industrial output grew by an average of […]
What explains patenting behaviour during Britain’s Industrial Revolution?
Abstract: A recent re-evaluation of patenting during the British Industrial Revolution argues patentees were responsive to demand-side conditions. This view does not consider supply-side factors, such as a patentee’s skill or access to financial resources, as an alternative mechanism. I exploit a rich dataset of patentee occupations to investigate the role a patentee’s economic or […]
A time to print, a time to reform
Abstract: The public mechanical clock and movable type printing press were arguably the most important and complex technologies of the late medieval period. We posit that towns with clocks became upper-tail human capital hubs—clocks required extensive technical know-how and fine mechanical skill. This meant that clock towns were in position to adopt the printing press […]
Urban growth shadows
Abstract: Does a location’s growth benefit or suffer from being geographically close to large economic centers? Spatial proximity may lead to competition and hurt growth, but it may also improve market access and enhance growth. Using data on U.S. counties and metro areas for the period 1840–2017, we document this trade-off between urban shadows and […]
That’s classified! Inventing a new patent taxonomy
Abstract: Innovation researchers currently make use of various patent classification schemas, which are hard to replicate. Using machine learning techniques, we construct a transparent, replicable and adaptable patent taxonomy, and a new automated methodology for classifying patents. We contrast our new schema with existing ones using a long-run historical patent dataset. We find quantitative analyses […]
Weber Revisited: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Nationalism
Abstract: We revisit Max Weber’s hypothesis on the role of Protestantism for economic development. We show that nationalism is crucial to both, the interpretation of Weber’s Protestant Ethic and empirical tests thereof. For late nineteenth-century century Prussia we reject Weber’s suggestion that Protestantism mattered due to an “ascetic compulsion to save.” Moreover, we find that […]
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