Chasing the perfida Albione: Anglo-Italian productivity gap in the late 1930s

Abstract

This paper presents new estimates of Anglo-Italian labour productivity levels in manufacturing in the late 1930s, derived using the standard single-deflation approach. The findings confirm a substantial productivity gap between Italy and the United Kingdom at the aggregate level, alongside pronounced intersectoral heterogeneity. Italy appears relatively competitive in textiles and, to a lesser extent, in iron and steel and in chemicals. Preliminary estimates using the more advanced double-deflation methodology, as well as tentative measures of productivity per hour worked, suggest that single-deflation figures may represent a lower-bound estimate. Nevertheless, the productivity gap remains large when benchmarked against other industrialized economies, lending support to a more pessimistic interpretation of the Fascist period in terms of labour productivity performance.