Barriers to Riches
本书探讨各国人均GDP差异的决定因素，认为关键在于采用先进技术的能力，而非人力资本积累的差异，并指出低人均GDP经济体中既得利益集团阻碍新技术采用是主因。
This book examines the determinants of the huge differences in GDP per capita across countries and forcefully argues for two propositions. One is that a key determinant of an economy's level of GDP per capita relative to the advanced industrial economies is its ability to employ the most advanced production technologies available in the world. The other is that the difference in the level of human capital accumulation across countries is not a key determinant of an economy's relative level of GDP per capita. The first proposition is expertly and convincingly argued and in my opinion will be accepted by almost all readers. I will concentrate my attention therefore on the second proposition, which is far more controversial. Parente and Prescott argue that there are two potential explanations for the large differences in GDP across countries, large differences in ‘intangible’ capital – e.g. human capital – across countries and large differences in Total Factor Productivity (TFP). They argue that large differences in intangible capital is unlikely to be the correct explanation as large differences in intangible capital would imply rates of return to intangible investments in low GDP per capita economies of about 40% which is not plausibly consistent with equilibrium. Furthermore, Parente and Prescott argue, cross country differences in TFP vary across industries whereas cross country differences in human capital accumulation, broadly speaking, do not. Thus the true explanation must be large differences in TFP. Parente and Prescott argue forcefully that these are caused by the existence of vested interests in old technologies in low GDP per capita economies, which block the introduction of new superior technologies in these economies.