Abstract

The global financial crisis of just over a decade ago exposed longer-term systemic problems in global capitalism of which two of the most prominent are the slowdown in the underlying trend rate of productivity growth, alongside a rise in economic and spatial inequalities in many advanced economies. The Covid-19 pandemic looks set to further amplify these problems. This Editorial begins by discussing the scale of the productivity slowdown and of the widening inequalities that have emerged, particularly with regard to their spatial dimension: that is how the uneven and slow development of productivity and rise in inequalities have played out across and within regions and cities. It then briefly considers underlying factors that lie behind these trends, including financialisation / financial globalization, the diminishing role of organised labour, segmentation of the labour market favouring workers who play a key role in financialisation, together with the increasing polarisation within societies according to skill and, crucially, the impact of changing industrial composition particularly as it relates to the rise of the high-tech sectors. The Editorial then examines in what ways the slowdown of productivity and widening of economic and spatial inequalities, may be interrelated, and questions the notion of any efficiency-equity trade-off. Lastly, it considers whether the ‘inclusive growth’ agenda can potentially reconcile the two ambitions of improving productivity performance and lessening inequalities, reflecting on what inclusive growth could mean, and what it could imply in terms of policy. Thus far, it appears that an inclusive growth agenda has only gained some traction at the subnational level, which seems to reflect – at least in part – attempts by cities and regions to address gaps in policy left by national governments.

中文翻译：

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重新思考地方的政治经济：生产力和包容性的挑战

摘要

大约十年前的全球金融危机暴露了全球资本主义的长期系统性问题，其中最突出的两个是生产力增长的潜在趋势速率下降，同时许多先进经济体的经济和空间不平等现象也在加剧。Covid-19大流行看起来将进一步加剧这些问题。本社论首先讨论生产率下降的规模和出现的不平等现象的扩大，特别是在其空间方面：这就是在整个区域和内部以及区域之间以及内部，生产率和不平等现象的发展缓慢而缓慢地发展的过程。城市。然后，它简要考虑了这些趋势背后的潜在因素，包括金融化/金融全球化，有组织劳动的作用逐渐减弱，劳动力市场的细分有利于在金融化过程中发挥关键作用的工人，以及社会上根据技能日益加剧的两极分化，以及至关重要的是，产业结构变化的影响尤其是与高科技行业的兴起有关。然后，《社论》研究了生产率下降与经济和空间不平等现象扩大之间可能以何种方式联系在一起，并对任何效率与公平之间的权衡的概念提出了质疑。最后，它考虑了“包容性增长”议程是否可以潜在地调和提高生产力绩效和减少不平等的两个雄心，从而反思了包容性增长的含义以及在政策方面的含义。迄今，