Some considerations on China's long-run economic growth: 1952-2015 from the analysis of factor contributions to that of the profit rate

This article offers methodological reflexions on China's long-term economic growth. We first construct time series of physical capital stocks going from 1952, close to the date of formation of the People's Republic, until 2015, by taking into account the latest yearbooks (I). Then, we test this new database to estimate the contributions of the production factors to GDP growth within the framework of various neoclassical models, highlighting the limitations of the latter (II). After that, an original framework is mobilized, in the spirit of the recent researches provided by Thomas Piketty, who combines mainstream references with components borrowing from Keynesian as well as neoinstitutionalist formalisations. Here, several problems associated with such researches are identified (III). Finally, we move the discussion towards a more promising approach, involving profit rate indicators, to deepen future studies of China's long-run economic growth (IV).