We revisit Max Weber’s hypothesis on the role of Protestantism for economic development. We show that nationalism is crucial to both, the interpretation of Weber’s Protestant Ethic and empirical tests thereof. For late nineteenth-century century Prussia we reject Weber’s suggestion that Protestantism mattered due to an “ascetic compulsion to save.” Moreover, we find that income levels, savings, and literacy rates differed between Germans and Poles, not between Protestants and Catholics, using pooled OLS and IV regressions. We suggest that this result is due to anti-Polish discrimination.

中文翻译：

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韦伯再访：新教伦理与民族主义精神

我们重新审视马克斯韦伯关于新教对经济发展的作用的假设。我们表明，民族主义对韦伯的新教伦理的解释及其实证检验都至关重要。对于 19 世纪后期的普鲁士，我们拒绝韦伯的建议，即新教之所以重要，是因为“苦行者的拯救冲动”。此外，我们使用汇总的 OLS 和 IV 回归发现，德国人和波兰人之间的收入水平、储蓄和识字率存在差异，而不是新教徒和天主教徒之间。我们认为这一结果是由于反波兰歧视。