In several articles published in the 1990s, de Long and Summers argued that investment in producer durables had a high propensity to generate externalities in using industries, resulting in a systematic and substantial divergence between its social and private return. They maintained, moreover,...

Manufacturing was responsible for almost all - 83 percent - of the growth of total factor productivity in the U.S. private nonfarm economy between 1919 and 1929. During the Depression manufacturing TFP growth was not as uniformly distributed, and only half as rapid, accounting for only 48...

Multifactor productivity growth in the U.S. economy between 1919 and 1929 was almost entirely attributable to advance within manufacturing. Distributing steam power mechanically over shafts and belts required multistory buildings for economical operation. The widespread diffusion of electric...