Should-Read: Nicholas Crafts: The Postwar British Productivity Failure

Should-Read: Nicholas Crafts: The Postwar British Productivity Failure: “British productivity growth disappointed during the early postwar period…

…inadequate investment in equipment and skills but also… inefficient use of inputs. Weak management, dysfunctional industrial relations, and badly-designed economic policy were all implicated. The policy framework was partly the result of seeking low unemployment through wage restraint by appeasement of organized labour. A key aspect was weak competition. This exacerbated corporate governance and industrial-relations problems in the British ‘variety of capitalism’ which sustained low effort bargains and managerial incompetence. Other varieties of capitalism were better placed to achieve fast growth but were infeasible for Britain given its history…