The Quality of Capital Goods
Much thinking assumes, then, that contributions to output from growth of individual inputs are independent of one another. This assumption allows many growth theorists to conclude that capital investment is relatively unimportant as a growth factor. If there is interaction between the rates of growth of the different inputs, however, then it is possible to draw different conclusions. For example, over time there are likely to be improvements in the quality of capital goods. A machine that requires so much steel and so much labor to manufacture may be twice as productive as an older machine that required the same amount of raw materials and labor in its manufacture. Thus the rate of growth of technical progress and the rate of growth of the capital stock measured in natural units interact. Furthermore, .the interaction between technical progress and capital formation is not necessarily in one direction. New knowledge opens up new production possibilities and gives rise to potential increases in technical progress and profits. Or the better educated the labor force, the more adaptable it is likely to be and therefore the better able to cope with new production techniques. At the same time, the higher the rate of growth of capital, the higher will be the growth of incomes and therefore the demand for education.
Conventional marginal productivity doctrine argues that as an input such as capital rises relative to labor, the additional output or marginal product that can be attributed to this extra amount of capital will be less than what a unit of capital on the average had been producing before. Marginal productivity doctrine also assumes that each unit of capital is identical with the next. This assumption is the basis for the argument that as more units of capital are utilized in production with a given amount of labor, it will push down the former's marginal product. There is the possibility, however, that additional units of capital may enhance the productivity of existing units: for example, an increase in the amount of capital resources devoted to the development of transportation and distribution may raise the productivity of capital employed, say, in manufacturing. The development of this kind of social overhead capital is certainly a prerequisite for a high return to capital in manufacturing, wholesaling, and retailing.
The analysis can be carried back one more step, to the basic determinants of growth. Economists ask why it is that capital, labor, or technical progress has grown more rapidly in one economy than in another or at one time than at another. Historically, the transition from a subsistence-level, underdeveloped state to a higher-level, developed one has been accompanied by a decline in the death rate followed by a decline in the birth rate. This has the effect of first speeding up the rate of growth of the population and labor force and then reducing it as birth rates fall. Migration can alter this picture, often unpredictably. In the United States, for example, the rate of growth of the population and labor force during the 19th and early 20th centuries was higher than in most other developed countries, mainly because of high rates of immigration. From 1840 to 1930, the native-born U.S. population increased about 600 percent, while the number of those of foreign birth increased 1,300 percent.
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