Nobel laureate in Economics, Robert E. Lucas Jr, delivered a lecture for ADEMU on March 21, 2016 at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy.

ADEMU researchers, economists and economics students crowded the room to hear the lecture on “Growth and the Industrial Revolution”.

Robert Lucas outlined a model to describe the industrial revolution, taking into account human capital economy and migration dynamics from rural to urban areas.

Lucas discussed the consequences of the ongoing movements of people out of traditional agriculture and the steadily increasing fraction of people who are well educated and work as “problem solvers”. He continued to explain that many people who are involved in traditional agriculture realise that it is a dead end job and those who can are leaving to escape to cities. Lucas concluded that ultimately, the countries that respond to these migrants by offering good schooling and challenging jobs will be the countries that get rewarded, such as the U.S. in the last century or South Korea and Taiwan in this one.

Download the slides of the lecture.