Comparative Development
The Solow model provides some guidance that rates of spending on capital goods and the population growth rate are important for the level of GDP per capita. The models of ideas and productivity then add that the commitment of resources (for example, R&D workers) to innovation matters, and also suggests that population size matters for the level of development (perhaps just globally).
In this section of the course we look more closely at reasons by individual countries differ in their living standards (level effects) even though their growth rates often look similar. This will lead to considering things like trade, IP rules, and institutions as plausible reasons for these differences.