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Corporations and partnerships: Factory productivity in late Imperial Russia Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-08-31 Nikita Lychakov
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Ethnic wealth inequality in England and Wales, 1858–2018 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-08-30 Neil Cummins
Using surnames from the universe of death and wealth-at-death records in England and Wales, from 1858 to 2018, I document the emergence of a modern ethnic wealth gradient. Historically, Non-British ethnicities have average wealth 2–5 times that of the English. However, this premium has decreased over the 20th century. By 1980, non-British ethnicities have no advantage over the British. However, this
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Fertility responses to short-term economic stress: Price volatility and wealth shocks in a pre-transitional settler colony Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-08-16 Jeanne Cilliers, Martine Mariotti, Igor Martins
This paper examines the effects of short-term economic stress, captured by general price volatility and a negative wealth shock on short-run fertility behavior in the rural pre-transitional society of the Cape Colony. First, we link complete birth histories of settler women from the South African Families database to consumer price index data to examine the effect of price volatility on conceptions
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Bank failures and economic activity: Evidence from the Progressive Era Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-07-28 Marco del Angel, Gary Richardson, Michael Gou
During the Progressive Era (1900–29), economic growth was rapid but volatile. Boom and busts witnessed the formation and failure of tens of thousands of firms and thousands of banks. This essay uses new data and methods to identify causal links between failures of banks and bankruptcies of firms. Our analysis indicates that bank failures triggered bankruptcies of firms that depended upon banks for
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Institutional discrimination and assimilation: Evidence from the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-07-25 Shuo Chen, Bin Xie
The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 marked a pivotal moment in U.S. immigration policy, effectively prohibiting Chinese immigration while institutionalizing discrimination against Asians within American society. This study investigates the repercussions of such institutional discrimination on the assimilation process of Asian immigrants, leveraging the timing of the enactment of the Act and the regional
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Print culture and economic constraints: A quantitative analysis of book prices in eighteenth-century Britain Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-07-15 Iiro Tiihonen, Leo Lahti, Mikko Tolonen
Who could afford books in the late early-modern period? We explore how prices related to the demand for books in eighteenth-century Britain by analysing extensive bibliographic and socio-economic data based on Bayesian statistics and machine learning. Our results quantify in financial terms the difficulty of buying print products faced by most British households in the eighteenth century, and how this
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Did the 1917–21 economic depression accelerate the epidemiological transition? Milk prices, summer peak of mortality, and food-and-water causes of death in Madrid, Spain Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-07-06 Michel Oris, Stanislao Mazzoni, Diego Ramiro-Fariñas
This article aims to answer a provocative question: would higher prices, particularly that of milk, be beneficial for the survival of children under 2 years old? Using a database of more than 230,000 births, matched to deaths, we test this hypothesis in the context of a large Mediterranean city, Madrid, in the years 1915–1926. During this period an inflationary crisis spread from 1917 to 1921. We compare
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European business cycles and economic growth, 1300–2000 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-06-22 Stephen Broadberry, Jason Lennard
The modern business cycle features long expansions combined with short recessions, and is thus related to the emergence of sustained economic growth. It also features significant international co-movement, and is therefore associated with growing market integration and globalisation. When did these patterns first appear? This paper explores the changing nature of the business cycle using historical
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Banking on innovation: Listed and non-listed equity investing, evidence from société générale de Belgique, 1850–1934 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-05-27 Gertjan Verdickt, Marc Deloof
Société Générale de Belgique was the world's first universal bank. It pioneered another innovation: investing in non-listed equity. We use hand-collected data to show that the bank earned significant positive risk-adjusted returns from 1850 to 1934. This offset its flat return on the listed equity portfolio and underperforming bond portfolio. Other Belgian universal banks followed this strategy. As
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How rich were the rich? An empirically-based taxonomy of pre-industrial bases of wealth Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-05-03 Branko Milanovic
The paper uses fifty-three social tables, ranging from Greece in 330 BCE to Mexico in 1940 to estimate the share and level of income of the top 1 % in pre-industrial societies. The share of the top 1 % covers a vast range from around 10 % to more than 40 % of society's income and does not always move together with the estimated Gini coefficient and the Inequality Extraction Ratio. I provide a taxonomy
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Courts, legislatures, and evolving property rules: Lessons from eminent domain Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Robert K. Fleck, F. Andrew Hanssen
This paper examines judicial and legislative modifications to a specific property rule, the benefit offset, which was widely employed by railroad companies during the 19th century as a way to reduce required compensation for land taken through eminent domain. At the beginning of the railroad boom, all states allowed the benefit offset; by the end of the boom, most states had banned it, some via court
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Contagion of fear: Panics, money, and the Great Depression Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-03-12 Fabrizio Almeida Marodin, Kris James Mitchener, Gary Richardson
Despite its centrality in debates about the causes and consequences of the Great Depression, banking panics’ impact on the money supply during this period remains a subject of ongoing debate. Before 1936, the Fed's decentralized structure meant that panics impacted money creation regionally while monetary impulses impacted bank stability nationally. We use this structure and newly digitized data to
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The Customary Atlas of Ancien Régime France Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-03-12 Victor Gay, Paula E. Gobbi, Marc Goñi
Customary law governed most European societies during the Middle Ages and early modern period. To better understand the roots of legal customs and their implications for long-run development, we introduce an atlas of customary regions of Ancien Régime France. We also describe the historical origins of French customs, their role as a source of law, and their legal content. We then offer some insights
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Does time heal all wounds? The rise, decline, and long-term impact of forced labor in Spanish America Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-03-05 Leticia Arroyo Abad, Noel Maurer
For most of human history, free wage labor was uncommon compared to various coercive institutions based on the threat of force. Latin America was no exception to this general rule. A number of scholars argue that past coercive labor institutions explain regional and national divergence within Latin America long after the institutions themselves have disappeared. A review of the literature, however
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Linked samples and measurement error in historical US census data Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2024-02-03 Sam Il Myoung Hwang, Munir Squires
The quality of historical US census data is critical to the performance of linking algorithms. We use genealogical profiles to correct measurement error in census names and ages. Our findings suggest that one in every two records has an error in name or age, and human capital is correlated with lower error rates. While errors in age decline across subsequent census rounds from 1850 to 1930, errors
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Monopsony power in the United States: Evidence from the great depression Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-12-30 Andrew Chase Holt
This paper presents evidence that firms had labor market power during the early 1930s. Using plant-level data from the Census of Manufactures between 1929 and 1935, I construct a Herfindahl-Hirschman Index of local labor market concentration at the State-Economic-Area-by-industry-by-occupation level. I find that local labor market concentration has a negative relationship with wages which is consistent
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Incomes and income inequality in Stockholm, 1870–1970: Evidence from micro data Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-12-08 Erik Bengtsson, Jakob Molinder
This paper analyzes incomes and income inequality in Stockholm from 1870 to 1970. The paper builds on a new dataset of 38,022 randomly sampled Stockholm residents 1870–1950, with information on income, occupation, age, gender, and household composition. This is complemented by the Census of 1930 and a Statistics Sweden sample for 1960 and 1970. Incomes were very unequally distributed between 1870 and
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Moderate opulence: the evolution of wealth inequality in Mexico in its first century of independence Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-11-27 Diego Castañeda Garza
This article presents the first complete 19-century reconstruction of the Mexican wealth distribution, from independence to the Mexican Revolution. It uses an often underutilized source in Mexican historiography: will inventories/protocols. In addition, the present article estimates the levels and trends of historical wealth inequality using five different methods, among them the application of the
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The political economy of assisted immigration: Australia 1860–1913 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-11-17 Timothy J. Hatton
From 1860 to 1913 the six colonies that became states of Australia strove to attract migrants from the UK with a variety of assisted passages. The colonies/states shared a common culture and sought migrants from a common source, the UK, but set policy independently of each other. This experience provides a unique opportunity to examine the formation of assisted immigration policies. Using a panel of
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Male and female self-selection during the Portuguese mass migration, 1885–1930 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-11-08 Martín Fernández, Gaspare Tortorici
This paper analyzes migrant self-selection from Portugal between 1885 and 1930 for both men and women. Leveraging newly digitized data on migrants’ characteristics across districts and literacy as a selection indicator, we document that self-selection was positive over the entire period but varied markedly across space and time. In some districts, migrants’ literacy was similar to the general population
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Unintended consequences: International trade shocks and electoral outcomes during the Second Spanish Republic, 1931–1936 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-11-04 Concepción Betrán, Michael Huberman
An intractable domestic conflict between forces on the right and the left roiled the Second Spanish Republic. We claim that international trade shocks exacerbated political instability. Leveraging an exposure design and disaggregated trade and employment data, we study the effects of import and export exposure on vote shares of parties and coalitions in the Republic's three elections, 1931, 1933, and
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Inland Bills of Exchange: Private Money Production without Banks+ Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-11-03 Gary Gorton
I study a sample of 482 English inland bills of exchange (where all parties to the bill were in England) during the period 1762-1850. Inland bills were used as a medium of exchange during the Industrial Revolution in the north of England. During this period, they circulated via indorsements, committing each indorser's personal wealth to back the bill. The number of endorsements is a measure of the
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De-skilling: Evidence from Late Nineteenth Century American Manufacturing Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-10-19 Jeremy Atack, Robert A. Margo, Paul W. Rhode
The long-standing view in US economic history is that the shift in manufacturing in the nineteenth century from the hand labor artisan shop to the machine labor of the mechanized factory led to “labor de-skilling” – the substitution of less skilled workers, such as operatives, for skilled craft workers. Investigating the Department of Labor's 1899 Hand and Machine Labor Study, we show the adoption
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The Impact of Public Transportation and Commuting on Urban Labor Markets: Evidence from the New Survey of London Life and Labour, 1929-32 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-10-05 Andrew J. Seltzer, Jonathan Wadsworth
The growth of public transport networks in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries had profound effects on commuting in the industrialized world, yet the consequences for labor markets during this important period of historical development remains largely unstudied. This paper draws on a unique dataset combining individual commuting and wage information for working-class residents of London
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What Fraction of Antebellum US National Product did the Enslaved Produce? Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-09-22 Paul W. Rhode
This article evaluates the high-profile claim that enslaved African-Americans produced over 50 percent of US national product in the pre-Civil War period. The accounting exercise shows the fraction was closer to (and indeed likely slightly below) the share of the population, that is, about 12.6 percent in 1860. The enslaved population had higher rates of labor force participation, but they were also
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Morts Pour la France: A database of French fatalities of the Great War Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-09-23 Victor Gay, Pauline Grosjean
This article describes the construction and content of the Morts pour la France database. This database contains individual-level data on the universe of the 1.3 million French fatalities of the Great War who were officially recognized as war victims. It provides information on each soldier’s first and last names, dates of birth and death, circumstances of death, recruitment status, military rank and
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Historical height measurement consistency: Evidence from colonial Trinidad Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-09-16 Alexander Persaud
Economists have used historical heights as markers of health, living standards, and long-run development. Although possible selection bias has been debated, height measurement error is less studied. I analyze novel administrative data of male Indian indentured laborers with repeated measurements of adult height to answer an important underlying question of precision. Laborers were measured by British
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Debt policy in Spanish America during the seventeenth century Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-09-15 Sergio Tonatiuh Serrano Hernández
This paper analyzes the policies that the Castile of the seventeenth century followed toward creating and selling short-term and long-term debt paid off from the Crown's New World revenues. We use microdata to reconstruct comprehensive fiscal accounts for Spanish America during the seventeenth century. Our new time series evidence shows that the Spanish Empire maintained differential debt policies
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Politics and eminent domain: Evidence from the 1879 California constitution Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-08-25 Mark Kanazawa
This paper explores the politics of eminent domain, using a specific historical episode: the enactment of the new California constitution in 1879. It presents evidence that the failure of a constitutional provision that would have codified eminent domain powers for water development resulted from a complex interchange of economic interests among farmers, miners, and urban residents. This evidence was
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The jobless recovery after the 1980–1981 British recession Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-08-19 Meredith M. Paker
Extensive research has been conducted on the concept of jobless recoveries and their potential causes, primarily focused on the United States from the 1990s. This paper finds that the prolonged employment downturn following the brief 1980–1981 recession in Britain qualifies as a jobless recovery and then investigates possible contributing factors: labor reallocation across industries, regional employment
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Paving the way to modern growth: The Spanish Bourbon roads Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-08-17 Miquel-Àngel Garcia-López, Alfonso Herranz-Loncán, Filippo Tassinari, Elisabet Viladecans-Marsal
This paper analyses the impact that Spanish road construction had on local population growth between 1787 and 1857. We find that the increase in market potential associated to road accessibility had a significant effect on local population growth. The impact was substantially higher on the municipalities that had a more diversified occupational structure. By contrast, the effect of the new network
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Quantifying racial discrimination in the 1944 G.I. bill Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-08-06 Maya Eden
Did the G.I. bill discriminate against Black World War II veterans? Using a variety of historical sources, I estimate the average amounts of G.I. benefits received by Black and white World War II veterans, as well as their cash-equivalents. These estimates suggest that Black veterans received more in benefits than white veterans, but that their cash-equivalents were lower. However, these estimates
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Stock returns and the Spanish flu, 1918–1920 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-08-06 Marco Del Angel, Caroline Fohlin, Marc D. Weidenmier
We study the impact of the 1918 Spanish Flu on U.S. stock prices. Using a new weekly hand collected sample of 131 firms that traded on the NYSE, we examine the impact of the four waves of the flu on stock returns using panel regressions. We find that the second and fourth wave of the pandemic significantly lowered stock returns by 65.5 and 21.6 percent relative to the sample mean return, respectively
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Historical newspaper data: A researcher’s guide Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-07-27 Brian Beach, W. Walker Hanlon
Digitized historical newspaper databases offer a valuable research tool. A rapidly expanding set of studies use these databases to address a wide range of topics. We review this literature and provide a toolkit for researchers interested in working with historical newspaper data. We provide a brief description of the evolution of historical newspapers, focusing on aspects that are likely to have implications
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The intergenerational transmission of higher education: Evidence from the 1973 coup in Chile Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-07-05 María Angélica Bautista, Felipe González, Luis R. Martínez, Pablo Muñoz, Mounu Prem
We estimate the transmission of higher education across generations using the arrival of the Pinochet dictatorship to Chile in 1973 as natural experiment. Pinochet promoted a large contraction in the number of seats available for new students across all universities. Using census data, we find that parents who reached college age shortly after 1973 experienced a sharp decline in college enrollment
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Women’s educational attainment, marriage, and fertility: Evidence from the 1944 G.I. Bill Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-06-30 Conor Lennon
In contemporary settings, greater earnings among women are typically associated with reduced marriage rates and lower fertility. One way that women’s earnings may increase is via changes in educational attainment. To study whether educational attainment affects marriage and fertility choices in a historical setting, I rely on the variation in educational attainment among female WWII veterans created
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Fueling the party machine: Evidence from Greece during Metapolitefsi Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-06-20 Pantelis Kammas, Maria Poulima, Vassilis Sarantides
The establishment of the Third Hellenic Republic in 1974 (Metapolitefsi) was characterized by an increased public demand for a less centralized political system. The main political parties that emerged responded by giving priority to the development of local and regional organizations and creating a wide network of grassroots movements. This led to a gradual introduction of more decentralized political
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Land Reform and Rural Conflict. Evidence from 1930s Spain Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-05-26 Sergi Basco, Jordi Domènech, Laura Maravall
Re-distributive policies are often used by governments to forestall conflict. This paper analyzes the evolution of rural conflict in a region of 1930s Spain in which fast transfers of land using temporal expropriations were aimed at reducing poverty and mitigate conflict. Using a subset of exogenous land transfers, we document that these transfers did not reduce conflict. If anything, they increased
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The economic impact of social distancing: Evidence from state-collected data during the 1918 influenza pandemic Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-05-25 Benjamin Bridgman, Ryan Greenaway-McGrevy
What are the long-run economic impacts of the policy responses to control pandemics? We investigate this question by exploiting state-collected data spanning one of the most consequential global pandemics in centuries, the 1918 influenza pandemic. Specifically, we use a difference-in-differences framework to examine the effects of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), ultimately finding no long-run
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Urban mortality and the repeal of federal prohibition Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-05-14 David S. Jacks, Krishna Pendakur, Hitoshi Shigeoka
Federal prohibition was one of the most ambitious policy interventions in US history. However, the removal of restrictions on alcohol after 1933 was not uniform. Using a new balanced panel on annual deaths, we find that city-level repeal is associated with a 11.6% decrease in the rate of death by non-automobile accidents, a category which critically include accidental poisonings. We relate this finding
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The forces of path dependence: Haiti's refugee camps, 1937–2009 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-05-04 Craig Palsson
Refugee camps are sudden, spontaneous population centers that can persist for years. Their persistence provides an opportunity to learn about the forces of path dependence. I argue that residents stay because the camps create local amenities. I examine this question using refugee camps established in Haiti after a 1937 massacre in the Dominican Republic. Despite the residents’ freedom to migrate, the
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The sleeping giant who left for America: Danish land inequality and emigration during the age of mass migration Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-03-11 Nina Boberg-Fazlić, Markus Lampe, Paul Sharp
What is the role of access to land for the decision to emigrate? We consider the case of Denmark between 1868 and 1908, when a large number of people left for America. We exploit the fact that the Danish agrarian reforms between 1784 and 1807 had differential impacts on the class of landless laborers around the country, and use detailed parish-level data police protocols of emigrants; population censuses
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THE PREMIUM FOR SKILLED LABOR IN THE ROMAN WORLD Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-02-19 Seth Bernard
Romans rewarded skill in material terms, and wage data reflects this. This study develops a method for understanding the return on skilling in the Roman period by focusing on internal pay scales observed in Egyptian documents. These data reveal a modal premium of 100 and mean of 74. Roman-period returns on training compare favorably with evidence from outside Egypt, especially detailed pay scales in
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Exploring 200 years of U.S. commodity market integration: A structural time series model approach Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-02-04 James M. Harrison
This paper uses a structural time series model to explore U.S. commodity market convergence, efficiency, and intertemporal smoothing from 1750–1949. I find near-continuous convergence that is largely concentrated in the frontier, broad antebellum efficiency gains, and intertemporal smoothing from the 1880s onward among the most perishable goods. The results reveal new periods of integration across
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Informed investors, screening, and sorting on the London capital market, 1891-1913 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-02-02
Thousands of prospectuses offered shares to British investors at the turn of the twentieth century. We find evidence that there were informed investors who participated in the market at this time. Firms that attracted additional investor demand were more likely to be listed on the London Stock Exchange, survive longer, and achieve better long-run equity returns. We find that the exchange screened lower
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Sweet equality: Sugar, property rights, and land distribution in colonial Java Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-01-21 Pim de Zwart, Phylicia Soekhradj
This article exploits a unique district-level dataset to investigate the relationship between sugar cultivation, property rights systems and land distribution in colonial Java around the turn of the twentieth century. We demonstrate a negative and statistically significant relationship between sugar cultivation and the landholder Gini. An IV strategy, employing a newly computed index of sugar suitability
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The long-run effects of childhood exposure to market access shocks: Evidence from the US railroad network expansion Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2023-01-02 Jeff Chan
In this paper, I use the expansion of the US railroad network from 1900 to 1910 and the resulting spatial variation in increased market access to investigate whether economic shocks that occur during childhood have long-run ramifications on later-life outcomes, and the channels through which such effects manifest. I link individuals across the 1900, 1910, and 1940 full-count US Censuses and incorporate
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Legacies of loss: The health outcomes of slaveholder compensation in the British Cape Colony Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-12-30 Igor Martins, Jeanne Cilliers, Johan Fourie
Can wealth shocks have intergenerational health consequences? We use the partial compensation slaveholders received after the 1834 slave emancipation in the British Cape Colony to measure the intergenerational effects of a wealth loss on longevity. We find that a greater loss of slave wealth shortened the lifespans of the generation of slaveholders that experienced the shock albeit these effects are
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Preface Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-12-29 Marianne Wanamaker, Carola Frydman, Christian M. Dahl
Abstract not available
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The last Yugoslavs: Ethnic diversity and national identity Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-12-26 Leonard Kukić
Nation-building is often proposed as a device for integration in ethnically divided societies. The determinants of national sentiment, however, remain imperfectly understood. This paper analyses the role of interethnic contact in the process of nation formation within multiethnic Yugoslavia, just before its disintegration in 1991. Using a variety of data sources and empirical strategies, I find that
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Measuring document similarity with weighted averages of word embeddings. Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-12-15 Bryan Seegmiller, Dimitris Papanikolaou, Lawrence D.W. Schmidt
We detail a methodology for estimating the textual similarity between two documents while accounting for the possibility that two different words can have a similar meaning. We illustrate the method’s usefulness in facilitating comparisons between documents with very different formats and vocabularies by textually linking occupation task and industry output descriptions with related technologies as
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Warfare and Economic Inequality: Evidence from Preindustrial Germany (c. 1400-1800) Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-12-14 Felix S.F. Schaff
What was the impact of military conflict on economic inequality? I argue that ordinary military conflicts increased local economic inequality. Warfare raised the financial needs of communities in preindustrial times, leading to more resource extraction from the population. This resource extraction happened via inequality-promoting channels, such as regressive taxation. Only in truly major wars might
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Revisiting the ‘Cobden-Chevalier network’ trade and welfare effects Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-11-17 Jacopo Timini
This study revisits the trade and welfare effects of 19th century bilateralism exploiting the latest developments in structural gravity models, including the consideration of domestic trade. Using bilateral trade data between 1855 and 1875, I show that the Cobden-Chevalier network, i.e. a system of bilateral trade agreements including the Most Favored Nation clause, has large, positive and significant
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Ancient nomadic corridors and long-run development in the highlands of Asia Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-11-15 Christopher Paik, Keshar Shahi
In this paper we explore the long-run settlement and economic activities in the highlands of Asia. The highland terrains uniquely determined seasonal migration paths by nomadic pastoralists (so called “nomadic corridors”), along which trade routes and settlements formed. Using simulated nomadic corridors as a proxy for ancient transportation networks, we study how closely contemporary economic activities
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Historical gender discrimination does not explain comparative Western European development: evidence from Portugal, 1300-1900 Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-11-05 Nuno Palma, Jaime Reis, Lisbeth Rodrigues
Gender discrimination has been pointed out as a determining factor behind the long-run divergence in incomes of Southern vis-à-vis Northwestern Europe. In this paper, we show that women in Portugal were not historically more discriminated against than those in other parts of Western Europe, including England and the Netherlands. We rely on a new dataset of thousands of observations from archival sources
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Foutu maximum: The political economy of price controls and national defense in revolutionary France Explor. Econ. Hist. (IF 2.6) Pub Date : 2022-10-15 Louis Rouanet
War necessitates both allocating real resources to defense and certain interest groups being in favor of the government raising resources to wage war. Price controls can be a tool for governments to mobilize additional resources while buying the support of certain key interest groups, hence making war politically viable. France during the revolutionary Terror, the first instance of widespread price