Sigma and beta convergence in three continents

Abstract

In this project we study sigma and beta convergence in terms of economic growth and productivity of some representative countries of three continents: Asia, Europe and America from 1960 to 2011. For this purpose we first revise briefly the economic growth theories which will help us to understand the concept of convergence. After that, we focus on the empirical analysis using data from Penn World Tables, both for GDP and total factor productivity during the period studied. We present and discuss the empirical results for sigma and beta convergence, first in terms of GDP and for productivity separated by continents. Finally we study the correlation between per capita GDP and productivity. We conclude that convergence has increased in some periods and decrease in others. Moreover, the differences among continents persist and there is a high degree of heterogeneity in the patterns of growth in GDP and productivity.