Economic Growth with Energy

Alam, M. Shahid (2006): Economic Growth with Energy.

Abstract

This paper works out some of the basic properties of an economy with energy as a factor of production. The economy now consists of streams of energy conversions that direct energy to the production of goods and services. The focus on energy generates a variety of insights. It yields a new taxonomy of economies and economic activities; allows a better grasp of the tasks performed by labor and capital; raises the prospect of examining growth as the speeding up of machines; and identifies greater use of energy as an important source of growth. In addition, we use these results to explain the near stagnation in living standards in agrarian economies in the millennia before 1800, and the dramatic acceleration in growth since that date.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Institution: Northeastern University, Boston
• Language: English
• Keywords: Economy; energy; capital; labor; growth; sources of growth; Adam Smith; John Stuart Mill; industrial revolution
• Subjects: Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q4 - Energy > Q40 - General; B - History of Economic Thought, Methodology, and Heterodox Approaches > B0 - General; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O4 - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity > O40 - General; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O4 - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity > O47 - Empirical Studies of Economic Growth ; Aggregate Productivity ; Cross-Country Output Convergence; Q - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics ; Environmental and Ecological Economics > Q0 - General > Q01 - Sustainable Development; D - Microeconomics > D2 - Production and Organizations

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