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A General-Purpose Technology at Work: The Corliss Steam Engine in the Late-Nineteenth-Century United States

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 March 2004

NATHAN ROSENBERG  and
MANUEL TRAJTENBERG
NATHAN ROSENBERG
Affiliation:
Professor Emeritus, Department of Economics, Stanford University, Economics Bldg 228, Stanford, CA 94305-6072; and Fellow, Canadian Institute of Advanced Research. E-mail: nate@stanford.edu.
MANUEL TRAJTENBERG
Affiliation:
Chairman, School of Economics, Tel Aviv University, Tel-Aviv 69978, Israel; Research Associate, National Bureau of Economic Research; and Fellow, Canadian Institute of Advanced Research. E-mail: manuel@post.tau.ac.il.
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Abstract

The contribution to growth from the steam engine—Industrial Revolution icon and prime example of a “General Purpose Technology”—has remained unclear. This article examines the role that a particular design improvement in steam power, embodied in the Corliss engine, played in the growth of the U.S. economy in the late nineteenth century. Using detailed data on the location of Corliss engines and waterwheels and a two-stage estimation strategy, we show that the deployment of Corliss engines served as a catalyst for the industry's massive relocation into large urban centers, thus fueling agglomeration economies and further population growth.

Type
ARTICLES
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 64 , Issue 1 , March 2004 , pp. 61 - 99
Copyright
© 2004 The Economic History Association

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