Abstract
I come from a state in the United States — Massachusetts — where the unemployment rate averaged 4 per cent in the mid-1980s, and from a metropolitan area — Boston — where the unemployment rate has been even lower. Furthermore, this is a region of the country which not such a very long time past bore roughly the same relation to the rest of the United States as Northern England does to Southern England today. In the early 1970s Massachusetts was a place with one of the worst unemployment rates in the United States, with empty textile or shoe factories and run-down blighted areas all over the landscape. How the economic turn-around occurred is a story that must be saved for another time. The point I wish to make here is this. Massachusetts today bears witness to the fact that there is no reason in principle why unemployment rates of 4 per cent or less should be unattainable.
This is an extended version of a lecture delivered on 7 July 1986 in the House of Commons. Martin Weitzmam is Mitsui Professor of Economics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Editor information
Copyright information
© 1989 Employment Institute
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Weitzman, M.L. (1989). The Case for Profit-Sharing. In: Shields, J. (eds) Making the Economy Work. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-20307-9_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-20307-9_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-0-333-47133-3
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-20307-9
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)