Modifying the success story of Sweden: Revised output and labour productivity figures for manufacturing, 1869–1950

The rampant growth rate of output and productivity in manufacturing borne out by Swedish Historical National Accounts (HNA) has nurtured the notion that the Swedish rise to prosperity was propelled by the confluence of disproportionately high levels of sophistication and very low levels of output per worker. The thrust of the argument is that this unique configuration allowed Sweden to leapfrog into modernization. The time has come to put this arresting claim under scrutiny, which is the foremost aim of this paper. This claim, we argue, is founded on a questionable empirical foundation. The most frequently used series of outputs from manufacturing at large and from groups of industries are those of the Swedish HNA. For several reasons, these series are inappropriate to use in studies assessing the rate of output and productivity increases before 1950. We have established new series of output and labour input for manufacturing at large between 1869 and 1950 that are suitable for investigations of productivity growth rates. The resulting series significantly raises the level of output per worker in the early part of the period and hence lowers the estimated growth rates of productivity for the era as a whole.