Convergence and deferred catch-up. Productivity leadership and the waning of American exceptionalism

Abstract

There are two lines of agency visibly at work shaping the habits of thought of [a] people in the complex movements of readjustment and rehabilitation [required by industrialization]. These are the received scheme of use and wont and the new state of the industrial arts; and it is not difficult to see that it is the latter that makes for readjustment; nor should it be any more difficult to see that the readjustment is necessarily made under the surveillance of the received scheme of use and wont. Thorstein Veblen, 1915 The comparative productivity experience of nations is commonly viewed as a race. But there is a difference between a runners ’ race and a productivity race between nations. In a track race, if one runner gets off to a fast start, there is no reason why, on that account alone, her rivals should then be able to run faster than she. A productivity race is different: under certain conditions, being behind gives a productivity laggard the ability to grow faster than the early leader. That is the main contention of the "convergence hypothesis. " The most striking example of the convergence to which this hypothesis refers was the experience since World War II, when America’s large lead eroded and the productivity levels of the other technologically advanced

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