Measuring Business Performance in the UK (1900-1986)
Principal Investigator: Philip Fliers
Funder: Carnevali Small Research Grant, Economic History Society (awarded 2021)
Funder: Carnevali Small Research Grant, Economic History Society (awarded 2021)
Project Description:
Research on pre-1986 evolution and performance of UK businesses is limited by the availability of historical accounting information. This lack of data has held back our understanding of the UK economy during the twentieth century. If we want to understand the future of UK businesses, we must look to a period prior to the availability of modern databases. This project aims to collect and digitise historical accounting data of the Top 100 listed companies in the UK between 1900 and 1986. The objective of this research is not only to transcribe all the accounting information into a database, but also to standardize accounting practices during the 20th Century. These accounting practices differed between firms within one single year and across time. By creating this framework to standardize historical accounting practices, we will be able to link our data to contemporary data sources such as Datastream and make comparisons over time. This allows us to trace the performance of UK businesses from the start of the twentieth century till the present day.
Project Objectives:
Research on pre-1986 evolution and performance of UK businesses is limited by the availability of historical accounting information. This lack of data has held back our understanding of the UK economy during the twentieth century. If we want to understand the future of UK businesses, we must look to a period prior to the availability of modern databases. This project aims to collect and digitise historical accounting data of the Top 100 listed companies in the UK between 1900 and 1986. The objective of this research is not only to transcribe all the accounting information into a database, but also to standardize accounting practices during the 20th Century. These accounting practices differed between firms within one single year and across time. By creating this framework to standardize historical accounting practices, we will be able to link our data to contemporary data sources such as Datastream and make comparisons over time. This allows us to trace the performance of UK businesses from the start of the twentieth century till the present day.
Project Objectives:
- Construct a database containing all accounting information of the Top 100 UK exchange listed companies between 1900 and 1986
- Standardise all accounting formats used during the 20th century
- Link the database to contemporary sources of accounting information