Some Implications of Post-War Primary Product Trends

Abstract

While studies of primary product price movements are notoriously sensitive to the choice of time period, the two decades since the end of World War II now comprise a coherent and convenient period for analysis. Indeed such analyses have already been conducted, and the fact that primary product prices have generally fallen during the period is well-known. In this paper are examined the shapes and shifts of the supply and demand curves implied by the observed unit value and trade volume trends for 46 primary products, from the late 1940s through the early 1960s.