The Past and the Future of Economic Growth

The world’s economic history has largely been a history of stagnation. The phase of sustained growth was only ignited in the second half of the 18th century by the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Since then, many countries have experienced long periods of sustained growth of per-capita income. At the same time, the world income distribution has become more and more unequal. Today per-capita incomes in the richest countries are approximately 30 times higher than in the poorest countries. The first part of this lecture takes a closer look at these past developments.

In the second part, we venture a look forward. Among the questions we will address are the following:

- Who needs economic growth? Does economic growth imply happiness? Is economic growth necessary to maintain our current standard of living? Does economic growth help the welfare state in the face of population aging and tight public budgets?
- Can the process of sustained economic growth go on? Is “no-growth” or even “degrowth” a reasonable option? Does the concept of sustainable growth help to answer these questions?
- What are the main challenges for and what are the main obstacles to growth today?