Alwyn Young


Alwyn Young is a professor of economics and the Leili & Johannes Huth Fellow at the London [School of Economics and Political Science]. He held a named chair at the University of Chicago and was on the faculty at Boston University and the MIT [Sloan School of Management] before joining the LSE faculty. A graduate of Cornell University, he holds an MA in law and diplomacy and a PhD in international relations, both from the Fletcher [School of Law and Diplomacy] at Tufts University, and a PhD in economics from Columbia University. Young has taught courses in introductory economics at the LSE to first-year undergraduates, and topics in modern economic growth as a part of advanced macroeconomics course at postgraduate level.
Well known academic papers by Alwyn Young include The tyranny of numbers: confronting the statistical realities of the East Asian growth experience and A tale of two cities: factor accumulation and technical change in Hong Kong and Singapore.
Professor Young's most recent research has focussed on growth in the African continent as well as the impact of HIV-Aids on GDP figures

Selected publications

  • "The Gift of the Dying: The Tragedy of AIDS and the Welfare of Future African Generations". Quarterly Journal of Economics 120 : 243–266. PDF. Appendix.
  • "Gold into Base Metals: Productivity Growth in the People’s Republic of China during the Reform Period". Journal of Political Economy 111 : 1220–1261.
  • "The Razor’s Edge: Distortions and Incremental Reform in the People’s Republic of China". Quarterly Journal of Economics 115 : 1091–1135. Data.
  • “Growth without Scale Effects". Journal of Political Economy 106 : 41–63. JSTOR.
  • "The Tyranny of Numbers: Confronting the Statistical Realities of the East Asian Growth Experience". Quarterly Journal of Economics 110 : 641–680. JSTOR.
  • "Lessons from the East Asian NICs: A Contrarian View.” European Economic Review 38 : 964–973.
  • "Substitution and Complementarity in Endogenous Innovation.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 108 : 775–807. JSTOR.
  • "Invention and Bounded Learning by Doing". Journal of Political Economy 101 : 443–472. JSTOR.
  • "A Tale of Two Cities: Factor Accumulation and Technical Change in Hong Kong and Singapore". In NBER, Macroeconomics Annual 1992. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1992. PDF.
  • "Learning by Doing and the Dynamic Effects of International Trade". Quarterly Journal of Economics 106 : 369–405. JSTOR.