Regular Article
The French Depression in the 1930s

https://doi.org/10.1006/redy.2001.0143Get rights and content

Abstract

This paper shows that, first, in contradiction with the conventional view regarding the French depression, there are more similarities than differences between the French and U.S. episodes in the 1930s, which suggests the need for an explanation with a similar cause; second, technological change (regression or stagnation) is neither sufficient nor necessary to account for the French depression; and third, institutional and market regulation changes provide an explanation that is quantitatively plausible, but the causes of those changes are still to be explained. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: E30, N14, N44.

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    Although we used a different measure of financial frictions, our analysis of the French Great Depression led us to the same conclusion. Beaudry and Portier (2002) showed that the French Great Depression cannot be explained by TFP. The results presented here shed new light on the depression in France during the 1930s.

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    On the other hand, Cole and Ohanian (1999) use the average growth rate of USA between 1919 and 1997, excluding the depression years and come up with 1.9%. Similarly, Beaudry and Portier (2002) use 2.98% France, which is the average growth rate of GDP per capita in France throughout the 20th century, excluding the depression years between 1930 and 1939. The choice of the relevant trend rate for Turkey will not only determine the depth of the recessions but also whether we can name several periods in Turkey as a “great depression” or not.

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The authors thank Timothy Kehoe and Ed Precott for having initiated this project, and Kevin Murphy, Pedro Amaral, Jim MacGee, and an anonymous referee for helpful comments.

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