IESET.
Hypotheses·growth·west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989

Starting from comparable 1945 post-war conditions — same ethnicity, language, pre-war German institutional and industrial inheritance, and with the GDR inheriting a larger share of pre-war industrial capital in Saxony and Thuringia — the Federal Republic's Soziale Marktwirtschaft (Ordoliberal market economy with welfare state) versus the German Democratic Republic's planned economy with administered prices, state-enterprise production, and soft budget constraints produced by 1989 a canonical divergence that pattern-matches >=7 of 10 pre-registered extreme-outcome metrics, each drawn from a different publisher or methodology family.

The canonical-case claim is that no other peacetime country pair separated for comparable duration from comparable 1945 starting conditions produced a divergence of this magnitude across this many independent outcome channels. A refutation (<=3 metrics met) would indicate that the consensus FRG/GDR gap was substantially overstated or that the framework's institutional-quality coding of market vs planned economies is mis-calibrated.

INCONCLUSIVEengine/runs/west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989

INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — no outcome variable loaded; missing: ['derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold met']

confidence cueResult card produced; verdict unclassified.

policy briefCoverage too thin

In ordinary language

Over a long period, do more market-oriented institutions translate into higher income or productivity, once the comparison looks beyond a single success story?

plain answer

This test cannot make a firm call yet. no outcome variable loaded; missing: ['derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold met']

why it matters

Growth claims can look convincing in single success stories. This test asks whether the pattern survives a broader comparison.

how the test works

It compares 2 country or place units from 1950 to 1989, using a multi metric checklist design.

what was measured
What we checked
  • Multi metric divergence score
what this does not prove

A single test is not the whole truth. It narrows the claim under a specific sample, time period, and method. Strong policy conclusions need the pattern to survive nearby tests, alternative data, and serious objections.

verification

14 input datasets, 0 unresolved missing series, provenance status: partial provenance.

Results

engine/runs/west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989
1007550250195019701989DEWDEE
illustrative sketch · run pending
No coefficients yet. When the model fires, this chart will show multi_metric_divergence_score across 2 sampled countries over 1950–1989.
The shapes above are stylised — none of the lines are real data.
Placeholder for west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989. Published chart will be generated from engine/runs/west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989/chart_data.json.

Who has skin in the game — schools predicting on this

17 schools list this hypothesis as a test of their position. The chips below are school-level scoreboard outcomes, not a second hypothesis verdict.

hypothesis verdict vs scoreboard outcome

The banner verdict judges this hypothesis as written. The scoreboard asks whether each school's polarity-corrected prediction was right. Raw status is not a school win: SUPPORTED supports schools that needed SUPPORTED, but refutes schools that needed REFUTED.

Austrian Business Cycle Theory (ABCT)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callChicago School Monetarismwins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callClassical Liberalwins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callDegrowth / Ecological Macroeconomicswins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callDemocratic Socialism (Bernsteinian revisionism + modern)wins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callStructuralist / Developmentalistwins if MIXEDpartial/no-callEco-Socialism / Red-Greenwins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callEmpirical Pragmatist (the framework's house position)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callNew Institutional Economicswins if MIXEDpartial/no-callMarket Socialism (Lange-Lerner tradition)wins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callMarxian Political Economywins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callMarxism-Leninism (central-planning implementation)wins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callModern Monetary Theorywins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callNew Keynesian (mainstream synthesis)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callOrdoliberalism (Freiburg School)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callPost-Keynesianwins if REFUTEDpartial/no-callSocial Democraticwins if REFUTEDpartial/no-call

Pre-registration

registration ordering unverified
first-spec commit 4c8ce8e · 2026-07-18T22:11:21Z
run generated · 2026-06-28T22:02:39Z
Run timestamp predates this path's first git-add commit (rebase, rename, or pre-git local run). Spec hash is still the path's first-add commit — not repository HEAD — but ordering is not a clean pre-registration proof.

Starting from comparable 1945 post-war conditions — same ethnicity, language, pre-war German institutional and industrial inheritance, and with the GDR inheriting a larger share of pre-war industrial capital in Saxony and Thuringia — the Federal Republic's Soziale Marktwirtschaft (Ordoliberal market economy with welfare state) versus the German Democratic Republic's planned economy with administered prices, state-enterprise production, and soft budget constraints produced by 1989 a canonical divergence that pattern-matches >=7 of 10 pre-registered extreme-outcome metrics, each drawn from a different publisher or methodology family. The canonical-case claim is that no other peacetime country pair separated for comparable duration from comparable 1945 starting conditions produced a divergence of this magnitude across this many independent outcome channels. A refutation (<=3 metrics met) would indicate that the consensus FRG/GDR gap was substantially overstated or that the framework's institutional-quality coding of market vs planned economies is mis-calibrated.

Falsification criterion — what would disprove this

set before the run · honoured after

This hypothesis is considered falsified if:

Hypothesis is SUPPORTED if >=7 of 10 canonical metrics meet their pre-registered thresholds. Hypothesis is REFUTED if <=3 of 10 metrics meet their thresholds. The 4-6 range is inconclusive. Additional falsification: if the DPRK/ROK canonical-case companion hypothesis is REFUTED by its own 10-metric checklist while FRG/GDR is SUPPORTED (or vice versa), the author must publish a note explaining why the framework coding generalises across the two classic system-divergence cases.

formal test & threshold
test:      multi_metric_canonical_case_pattern_match
threshold: metrics_met_germany_pair >= 7

Method

Template
multi_metric_checklist
Sample
2 countries · 1950 – 1989
Evidence type
canonical_case_multi_metric

For each of the 10 canonical metrics, the evaluator fetches the specified source(s) and evaluates the threshold expression. Support if metrics_met >= 7, refute if metrics_met <= 3, inconclusive in the 4-6 range. Benchmark check: no other contiguous ethnically-identical country pair separated 1945-1989 from comparable 1945 starting conditions should match >=4 of these 10 thresholds (the only credible peer is the DPRK/ROK pair, which is the subject of its own canonical-case hypothesis).

Data

VariableSourceTransform
multi_metric_divergence_score
outcome
derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold metcount

● ready  · ● pending  · ● reconstruct-needed

Detailed result card

Result card — west_east_germany_economic_system_divergence_1950_1989

Verdict: INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — no outcome variable loaded; missing: ['derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold met']

Pre-registration

  • Claim: Starting from comparable 1945 post-war conditions — same ethnicity, language, pre-war German institutional and industrial inheritance, and with the GDR inheriting a larger share of pre-war industrial capital in Saxony and Thuringia — the Federal Republic's Soziale Marktwirtschaft (Ordoliberal market economy with welfare state) versus the German Democratic Republic's planned economy with administered prices, state-enterprise production, and soft budget constraints produced by 1989 a canonical divergence that pattern-matches >=7 of 10 pre-registered extreme-outcome metrics, each drawn from a different publisher or methodology family. The canonical-case claim is that no other peacetime country pair separated for comparable duration from comparable 1945 starting conditions produced a divergence of this magnitude across this many independent outcome channels. A refutation (<=3 metrics met) would indicate that the consensus FRG/GDR gap was substantially overstated or that the framework's institutional-quality coding of market vs planned economies is mis-calibrated.
  • Falsification rule: Hypothesis is SUPPORTED if >=7 of 10 canonical metrics meet their pre-registered thresholds. Hypothesis is REFUTED if <=3 of 10 metrics meet their thresholds. The 4-6 range is inconclusive. Additional falsification: if the DPRK/ROK canonical-case companion hypothesis is REFUTED by its own 10-metric checklist while FRG/GDR is SUPPORTED (or vice versa), the author must publish a note explaining why the framework coding generalises across the two classic system-divergence cases.
  • Falsification test: multi_metric_canonical_case_pattern_match
  • Event year: (not extracted)

Estimate

  • Error: no outcome variable loaded; missing: ['derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold met']

Variables resolved

Variables missing data

  • derived: count of canonical_metrics with threshold met (outcome, name=multi_metric_divergence_score)

Generated by scripts/run_event_study.py at 2026-06-28T22:02:39+00:00

Strongest opposing argument

Every hypothesis ships with its charitable opposing argument. The framework earns credibility by handling objections at their strongest, not weakest.

Notes

Methodological rationale: a single-estimator causal test on the FRG/GDR pair is weak because (a) the comparator GDR used MPS not SNA accounting with documented upward output bias, (b) the treatment bundle is not separable into policy levers with independent counterfactuals, and (c) multiple orthogonal measurement stacks (party-archive consumer data, post-1989 privatisation outcomes, post-unification environmental surveys, Stasi archive releases) provide independent robustness anchors that make a pre-registered 10-metric pattern-match epistemically stronger than any single panel/DiD/synthetic-control estimate. The steelman (Marshall Plan aid, Ruhr-Rhine industrial inheritance, pre-1961 labour windfall from Eastern migration, Soziale-Marktwirtschaft not being laissez-faire, Soviet reparations extracting from the East) is NOT resolved by the multi-metric test — it concerns attribution within the bundle. The canonical-case hypothesis only claims the bundle produced the observed divergence, not that any single sub-channel is solely responsible. Within-bundle attribution is the subject of separate narrower hypotheses (e.g. synthetic-control against Austria + Czech lands to isolate system-effect from initial-conditions). Pre-1945 country codes DEW (FRG) and DEE (GDR) are preserved for cross-file consistency with the existing dataset; both codes were adopted in the v1 specification and are retained here.

Authored framework. Read the transparency note.