Economic growth in Cuba (1902-1959). A revision and new considerations in comparative perspectives (population, migrant labor, non sugar related revenue and gross national product)

Until this moment, the available estimations about Cuban GNP indicated a 0 strong stagnation of the income per capita in the period after the crisis o f 1930, and a drastic waste of convergence with regard to the more develope d economies in Latin America. This one contrast with the comparative perfor mance of other welfare indicators, which evolved in the same way on the isl and and in these economies. Our research shows such estimations underestima te the level and growth of the GNP per capita in the 1940s and 1950s ought to use demographic data which does not record all the population settled re ally in the country and undervalues the output of the activities less conne cted with the external sector. To resolve such faults we are calculating a new series of incomes of the ears 1900-1960. The analysis of this series sh ows the aforementioned stagnation and waste of convergence has been exagger ated, however, this one corroborates that the Cuban economy suffered before the revolution of 1959 serious problems of growth, fundamentally owing to institutional reasons; because of the consolidation of measurements which w ere efficacious in front of the Great Depression, but they appeared inadequ ate to solve later situations.