Industrial Policy in Britain 1945-1951 : Economic Planning, Nationalisation and the Labour Governments

This study examines the economic planning of the Attlee governments and discusses the interaction between the workings of economic planning and its effects on business decision-making. The book spreads across a range of historical, economic and political boundaries enabling the author to build up a picture of the chief issues in the political economy of the period.

This is a detailed archive-based study of the economic planning of the Attlee governments, in which the author seeks to analyse the interaction between the decisions of central planners and the micro-economic effects of these decisions. Throughout the book, Martin Chick pays particular attention to the level, pattern and quality of fixed capital investment. At the same time, there is a continuous concern with the struggle between politicians, economists and industrialists over the mix of pricing mechanisms and administrative orders which were to be used in this period. This struggle permeated all discussions over matters such as the organisation of nationalised industries, the monopoly structure of nationalised industries, the allocation of resources and the promotion of higher productivity. The author also asks what impact, if any, economic planning had on the productivity performance of the UK economy.