Acceso usuarios
This paper presents a model of very-long-term economic development, distinguishing between an epoch of exogenous economic development, corresponding to traditional economies, in which structural transformations were rare and exceptional, and an epoch of endogenous economic development, corresponding to Kuznets’ “modern economic growth”, in which structural transformations have become frequent. Within the framework presented here, it is possible to explain modern economic growth as a consequence of the fact that scientific and technological research is a superior good whose results promote structural transformations in the economy that enlarge its viability zone. Thus, the very fact that per capita income exceeded some threshold levels triggered endogenous economic development on a global scale. Episodes of divergence and convergence among national and regional economic systems within the contemporary world economy can be at least partially explained by feedback effects of the economic development processes.
