The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in Germany expanded 0.40 percent in the first quarter of 2025 over the previous quarter. This dataset provides the latest reported value for - Germany GDP Growth Rate - plus previous releases, historical high and low, short-term forecast and long-term prediction, economic calendar, survey consensus and news.

This article shows how the network structure of economic expertise can influence the diffusion of ideas in economic policymaking. Applying social network analysis, we analyse the networks of economic policy advice in the United States and Germany around the Council of Economic Advisors and the Sachverständigenrat. With the help of co-publication and institutional affiliation data, we argue that the more fragmented structure of academic expertise in Germany hindered the diffusion of new ideas and fostered continuity in the austerity paradigm. In contrast, the more connected structure of economic expertise in the United States facilitated the diffusion of ideas and changes in dominant ideas about economic intervention.

Between 1946 and 1961, the United States distributed over 44.5 billion U.S. dollars to Western European countries in the form of loans or grants. 27.3 billion was given in the form of economic assistance, while 17.2 billion was given as military assistance. The largest sums were given to the United Kingdom and France, who received 8.8 and 8.4 billion dollars respectively. Italy and West Germany, who had been enemies of the U.S. during the Second World War, received the next-largest sums, with both totals over five billion dollars. Disproportional distributions Such grants and loans, particularly those of the Marshall Plan, were distributed on a (fairly rough) per capita basis, although major industrial powers were given disproportionately higher sums, as it was believed that their successful recovery would drive prosperity across the region. Turkey and Greece were also given relatively high sums due to their political and strategic significance during the Cold War, with Turkey receiving significantly more in military assistance than economic. In contrast, Spain received a disproportionately low sum - despite being neutral during the war, Franco's fascist government was unpopular in the U.S. and was excluded from aid in the years immediately following the war; the Spanish government's strong anti-communist saw the U.S. revert this policy with the Pact of Madrid in 1953. The Golden Age The "Golden Age" was a period of relatively uninterrupted economic growth between the end of the Second World War in 1945 and the Recession of 1973-1975. During this time, Western Europe experienced its most economically successful period in recorded history. This success was made possible by various factors, including an increase in European integration, the expansion of welfare and healthcare systems, and widespread industrialization. The United States played a key role in these developments; however, the modern historical consensus is that the largest impact was not through government investment, but rather private investment and the American influence on business practice, consumer buying behavior, and international policy (critics at the time referred to this as Coca-colonization). Along with the new-found peace following decades of war and instability, these factors combined to increase living standards and wages among the public, who generally embraced capitalism and the opportunity to spend their new-found disposable income.

The aim of the present study is to get insights of the postulated correlation between ‘basic innovations’ and ‘growth industry’ on the basis of the industrial net production’s growth rates of 50 industrial branches. It is demonstrated, that the growth industries of the 1950s and 1960s are identical with those industries, which has been affected by significant basic innovations in the 1930s and 1940s (plastics processing, oil industry, aircraft construction, electrical engineering, chemical industry, and vehicle construction). At the same time it is shown that the phenomenon of economic recession at the end of the 1970s coincides with the relative stagnation of these growth industries. Following the published research results on the historical emergence of basic innovations by Gerhard Mensch in 1977 (see: Mensch, G., 1977: Das technologische Patt – Innovationen überwinden die Depression. Frankfurt/M.) the investigator Kleinknecht developed hypotheses and first examination steps for an innovation theoretical interpretation of longer trend periods of economic growth. The researcher Mensch showed, that basic innovations on particular time points become more frequent (by about 1830/40, by about 1885 and by about 1935). These time points emerged in a period, which was discussed in the literature as phase of weaker economic development. According to the innovation theorists these basic innovations would create new markets and growth industries (in the case of product innovations) and existing industries change radically (in the case of process innovations). Due to the diffusion of new products or production processes sectoral growth spurts may occur, which extend over several economic cycles and therefore enables stable economic growth. In periods of accelerated economic growth only few new basic innovations are enforceable and accordingly an insufficient amount of new growth industries occurs. The economy would experience a period of instable growth and increased crise-prone which follows after the end of the sectoral growth spurts. This period of technological stand-off can only be resolved by new impulses of basic innovations. If this thesis carries a certain reality, it would be possible to show that during the periods of stronger economic growth these industries respectively emerge, which experienced weaker growth in past periods an which had been affected by basic innovations or which were developed by basic innovations. Drawing from an investment function, in which the development of industrial profit rates is defined as fundamental aspect of investments and growth, it would be possible to demonstrate, that basic innovations have a fundamental and positive effect on profit rates (return on capital) and its determinants. The hypotheses are tested using the example of the West German economy development between 1950 and 1977. The investigator Kleinknecht tied in with a casebook of basic innovations in the 1930s and 1940s, collected by Gerhard Mensch (1977). In his analysis Kleinknecht act on the assumption, that most of the basic innovations, which have been catched on after the strong economy crisis in 1929/32, principally developed their growth potential during the 1950s and the 1960s. In the first step single cases of basic innovation has been allocated to those branches of industry, which has been concerned with the production of innovative products in a decisive way or which has integrated process innovations in their production. As categorization system the list of industrial groups and industrial sectors („Verzeichnis der Industriegruppen und –zweige“) was used, which has been also taken as a basis for the development of statistical indices series for 48 sectors of the processing industry and the mining industry by the German Institute of Economic Research (Deutschen Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW, Berlin)). Kleinknecht refers in his work to these series of the DIW, when he analyzes the industrial production, the capital output ratio, etc. . For the analysis of the growth rates of 48 West German industrial sectors (manufacturing Industry and mining) the growth rates of the industrial net production at constant prices, calculated in the study of Krengel et al., were used and in the following calculated for the whole period of investigation and for subdivided time frames of the investigation period. The subdivided time frames corresponds the economic cycles between 1950 and 1977. Datatables in the search- and downloadsystem HISTAT (Topic: Growth, Economic Cycles, and Crisis = Wachstum, Konjunktur und Krisen): Annotation: HISTAT is offered in German. A. Identifikation der Wachstumsindustrien (Produktionszuwächse): A.01a Durchschnittliche jährliche Zuwächse der industriellen Nettoproduktion nach Industriezweigen (1950-1973) A.01b Relative Beiträge der einzelnen Zweige zum Gesamtzuwachs der Industrieproduktion nach Industriezweigen (1950-1973) A.02 Zyklendurchschnittliche Zuwächse der ´Inno...

As of July 22, 2025, the yield for a ten-year U.S. government bond was 4.38 percent, while the yield for a two-year bond was 3.88 percent. This represents an inverted yield curve, whereby bonds of longer maturities provide a lower yield, reflecting investors' expectations for a decline in long-term interest rates. Hence, making long-term debt holders open to more risk under the uncertainty around the condition of financial markets in the future. That markets are uncertain can be seen by considering both the short-term fluctuations, and the long-term downward trend, of the yields of U.S. government bonds from 2006 to 2021, before the treasury yield curve increased again significantly in the following years. What are government bonds? Government bonds, otherwise called ‘sovereign’ or ‘treasury’ bonds, are financial instruments used by governments to raise money for government spending. Investors give the government a certain amount of money (the ‘face value’), to be repaid at a specified time in the future (the ‘maturity date’). In addition, the government makes regular periodic interest payments (called ‘coupon payments’). Once initially issued, government bonds are tradable on financial markets, meaning their value can fluctuate over time (even though the underlying face value and coupon payments remain the same). Investors are attracted to government bonds as, provided the country in question has a stable economy and political system, they are a very safe investment. Accordingly, in periods of economic turmoil, investors may be willing to accept a negative overall return in order to have a safe haven for their money. For example, once the market value is compared to the total received from remaining interest payments and the face value, investors have been willing to accept a negative return on two-year German government bonds between 2014 and 2021. Conversely, if the underlying economy and political structures are weak, investors demand a higher return to compensate for the higher risk they take on. Consequently, the return on bonds in emerging markets like Brazil are consistently higher than that of the United States (and other developed economies). Inverted yield curves When investors are worried about the financial future, it can lead to what is called an ‘inverted yield curve’. An inverted yield curve is where investors pay more for short term bonds than long term, indicating they do not have confidence in long-term financial conditions. Historically, the yield curve has historically inverted before each of the last five U.S. recessions. The last U.S. yield curve inversion occurred at several brief points in 2019 – a trend which continued until the Federal Reserve cut interest rates several times over that year. However, the ultimate trigger for the next recession was the unpredicted, exogenous shock of the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, showing how such informal indicators may be grounded just as much in coincidence as causation.