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The diffusion of soft technologies during and after WWII

Hosted by the Department of Economic History

In-person and online public event (Auditorium, Centre Building)

Speaker

Dr Michela Giorcelli

Dr Michela Giorcelli

Chair

Professor Patrick Wallis

Professor Patrick Wallis

British business productivity growth has been lagging for the past couple of decades, and key to the Labour government’s goal of improving economic growth is raising productivity. This lecture explores a period of very high productivity growth in history, WWII, to understand the sources of productivity growth generally. Traditionally, World War II has been considered the source of “an extraordinary surge of growth” in the US, thanks to the advancements in science and technology it pushed. Michela Giorcelli argues that wartime was also a major inflection point in the history of American business.

The large-scale diffusion of innovative management practices to US firms involved in war production acted as a technology that put them on a higher growth path for decades, but also helped creating the “American Way” of business.

Meet our speaker and chair

Michela Giorcelli (@m_giorcelli) is Associate Professor (with tenure) at the Department of Economics of UCLA. She is also a faculty associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and a research affiliate at CEPR, CESifo, IZA, J-PAL and CCPR. She serves as Associate Editor at the Journal of Economic History. She holds a PhD in Economics from Stanford University.

Patrick Wallis (@phwallis) is Professor of Economic History in the Department of Economic History at LSE. His research explores the economic, social and medical history of Britain and Europe from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century.

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The Department of Economic History (@LSEEcHist) is one of the world's leading centres for research and teaching economic history. It is home to a huge breadth and depth of knowledge and expertise ranging from the medieval period to the current century.

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This public event is free and open to all. This event will be a hybrid event, with an in-person audience and an online audience. 

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For the online event: Registration for this event will open in the first half of January.

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