Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Preface to the English edition
- Preface to the German edition
- List of original chapter titles and first places of publication
- Abbreviations
- 1 Protectionism in historical perspective
- 2 Was there a capital shortage in the first half of the nineteenth century in Germany?
- 3 Regional variations in growth in Germany in the nineteenth century with particular reference to the west—east developmental gradient
- 4 Investment in education and instruction in the nineteenth century
- 5 Changes in the phenomenon of the business cycle over the last hundred years
- 6 Trends, cycles, structural breaks, chance: what determines twentieth-century German economic history?
- 7 The Federal Republic of Germany in the secular trend of economic development
- 8 Germany's experience of inflation
- 9 Constraints and room for manoeuvre in the great depression of the early thirties: towards a revision of the received historical picture
- 10 Economic causes of the collapse of the Weimar Republic
- 11 Germany's exchange rate options during the great depression
- Notes
- Index
2 - Was there a capital shortage in the first half of the nineteenth century in Germany?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Preface to the English edition
- Preface to the German edition
- List of original chapter titles and first places of publication
- Abbreviations
- 1 Protectionism in historical perspective
- 2 Was there a capital shortage in the first half of the nineteenth century in Germany?
- 3 Regional variations in growth in Germany in the nineteenth century with particular reference to the west—east developmental gradient
- 4 Investment in education and instruction in the nineteenth century
- 5 Changes in the phenomenon of the business cycle over the last hundred years
- 6 Trends, cycles, structural breaks, chance: what determines twentieth-century German economic history?
- 7 The Federal Republic of Germany in the secular trend of economic development
- 8 Germany's experience of inflation
- 9 Constraints and room for manoeuvre in the great depression of the early thirties: towards a revision of the received historical picture
- 10 Economic causes of the collapse of the Weimar Republic
- 11 Germany's exchange rate options during the great depression
- Notes
- Index
Summary
Among the answers to the question as to why Germany's economic development until the middle of the nineteenth century remained so strikingly behind that of England, the argument that capital for industrialisation was lacking has played a comparatively major role for a long time. It has only occasionally been challenged, and then rather in passing. Certainly the sources themselves, and above all the records of companies, suggest a certain bias in this direction. Naturally we hear more of complaints about the lack of capital than about the opposite. But it will be demonstrated below that this thesis is not self-evidently correct, and that there are good grounds for examining it rather more precisely, and on the whole for relativising it.
When one reads of a ‘lack of capital’ we must appreciate that many different things can be meant. Here lies a source of great misunderstanding, because many authors do not clearly explain what they mean. By a lack of capital (or of finance) we can understand either
(a) an inadequate flow of purchasing power, or
(b) an inadequate stock of capital.
Depending on which flow is observed, judgements can be made in respect of the size of
(1) the collective savings of an economic system,
(2) the collective supply of investible funds, or
(3) the credit supply in a specified period.
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- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1991