Abstract
The following pages present some provisional hypotheses to account for apparent features of the movement of real wages in the past eighty years.2 They await the test of critical discussion, and also of the production of more evidence, for though in part they rest upon estimates of wages and income in five Western economies, the explanation of shifts in distribution has been worked out for the United Kingdom alone.
I am indebted to my colleagues Dr. S. A. Ozga and Mr. J. Wiseman for great help given me by comment on a draft of this paper.
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Notes
The studies specially drawn upon here have been published over my name as follows: (with S. V. Hopkins), ‘The Course of Wage-Rates in Five Countries, 1860–1939’, Oxford Economic Papers, ii (June 1950);
(with P. E. Hart) ‘The Share of Wages in National Income’, Economic Journal, lxii (June 1952);
(with S. J. Handfield-Jones), ‘The Climacteric of the 1890’, Oxford Economic Papers, iv (October 1952);
(with B. Weber), ‘Accumulation, Productivity, and Distribution in the British Economy, 1870–1938’, Economic Journal, lxiii (June 1953);
(with S. A. Ozga), ‘Economic Growth and the Price Level’, Economic Journal, (March 1955).
A. L. Bowley, Wages and Income in the United Kingdom since 1860 (1937), Appendix B.
C. W. Cobb and P. H. Douglas, ‘A Theory of Production’, American Economic Review, Supplement (March 1928).
P. H. Douglas, The Theory of Wages (1934).
P. H. Douglas, ‘Are There Laws of Production?’ American Economic Review (March 1948).
M. Kalecki, ‘The Distribution of the National Income’, Essays in the Theory of Economic Fluctuations (1939); ‘Long Run Theory of Distribution’, Oxford Economic Papers (1941); ‘Costs and Prices’, Studies in Economic Dynamics (1943).
B. Weber and S. J. Handfield-Jones, ‘Variations in the Rate of Economic Growth in the U.S.A., 1869–1939’, Oxford Economic Papers (June 1954), Fig. 6,
J. M. Keynes, ‘The General Theory of Employment’, Quarterly Journal of Economics, li (February 1937).
See also R. F. Harrod, ‘Price and Cost in Entrepreneurs’ Policy’, Oxford Economic Papers (May 1939).
Brown and Ozga, ‘Economic Growth and the Price Level’, Economic Journal (March 1955).
Brown and Hart, ‘The Share of Wages in National Income’, Economic Journal (June 1952), p. 269.
A. E. C. Hare, Report on Industrial Relations in New Zealand (1946), p. 109. In factory industry a rise of 50 per cent in total wages in two years went with a rise only from 66–1 to 70.7 per cent in the share of wages in the net product.
M. Kalecki, ‘The Lessons of the Blum Experiment’, Economic Journal (March 1938);
R. Marjolin, ‘Reflections on the Blum Experiment’, Economica (May 1938).
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© 1957 International Economic Association
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Brown, E.H.P. (1957). The Long-Term Movement of Real Wages. In: Dunlop, J.T. (eds) The Theory of Wage Determination. International Economic Association Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-15205-6_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-15205-6_4
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