This paper examines the effect of agricultural development on a country's overall development and growth experience. In most poor countries, large fractions of land, labor, and other productive resources are devoted to producing food for subsistence needs. This 'food problem' can delay a...

This essay develops a theory of the evolution of international income levels. In particular, it augments the Hansen-Prescott theory of economic development with the Parente-Prescott theory of relative efficiencies and shows that the unified theory accounts for the evolution of international...

Why is the adoption of more productive technologies more fiercely resisted in some societies than in others? This paper examines the role of market size and free trade in determining whether firms or workers resist the adoption of more advanced technologies. It puts forth a model whereby the...

This paper puts forth a unified theory of growth that captures a number of relevant features of countries’ transitions from stagnant, predominantly rural economies to vibrant, industrialized economies that have been overlooked by the literature. In our theory, increasing variety of consumer...