The Productivity Mystery

The economic development of the Danish economy during the 1980s presents an ideal case of the present period of structural change. Economic prospects looked good during the mid-eighties, where the Danish economy was booming and experienced high growth rates of production, investments, employment and profits. But contrary to the predictions of conventional macro-economic theory, the growth of productivity declined and became even negative in the manufacturing sector during the years of 1984-86. What was actually happening? Could the Danish experience be explained by failures and mistakes of the fine-tuning of economic policy and the policies of technological and industrial policy? The book on The Productivity Mystery presents a study of these questions and related issues of structural change. The book studies the relationship between business fluctuations and technical change and, in particular, it presents som explanations of the problems of technical change experienced by Danish manufacturing companies.

The study is of interest to everyone with an interest in the issues of economic policy and industrial development.