|
on Business, Economic and Financial History |
|
Issue of 2021‒05‒03
28 papers chosen by |
| By: | Palma, Nuno (University of Manchester; ICS, Universidade de Lisboa; CEPR & CAGE); Reis, Jaime (ICS, Universidade de Lisboa); Rodrigues, Lisbeth (ISEG, Universidade de Lisboa) |
| Abstract: | Gender discrimination has been pointed out as a determining factor behind the long-run divergence in incomes of Southern vis-Ã -vis Northwestern Europe. In this paper, we show that there is no evidence that women in Portugal were historically more discriminated against than those of other parts of Western Europe, including England and the Netherlands. We rely on a new dataset of thousands of observations from archival sources which cover six centuries, and we complement it with a qualitative discussion of comparative social norms. Compared with Northwestern Europe, women in Portugal faced similar gender wage gaps, married at similar ages, and did not face more restrictions to labor market participation. Consequently, other factors must be responsible for the Little Divergence of Western European incomes. |
| Keywords: | Historical gender discrimination, gender wage gap, culture, social norms, comparative development, the Little Divergence, European Marriage Pattern. JEL Classification: N13, N33, J16 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:551&r= |
| By: | Pushkar Maitra (Monash University, Department of Economics); William Yu (Monash University) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the long-term impacts of infrastructural investment. It considers the case of British investment in railway infrastructure in colonial India. Railways had an immediate impact on trade and development in the predominantly agricultural India. In this paper, we show that the positive effects of railways have persisted over more than a century. Districts of the Indian sub-continent that were connected to railways earlier continue to have higher levels of economic prosperity and lower rural poverty rates a century later. Men and women residing districts connected earlier are less likely to be uneducated or malnourished. Districts further away from connected districts are worse o in terms of levels of economic development in 2013. The corresponding IV estimates are larger in magnitude than the OLS estimates indicating that the OLS estimates provide a lower bound to the effect of exposure to railways on long run prosperity. The persistent effects appear to be driven by agglomeration due to early exposure to trade and globalization as a result of connectedness. |
| Keywords: | Infrastructure, Railways, Long Run Prosperity, Colonial India |
| JEL: | O11 N75 O18 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2021-01&r= |
| By: | Stephen Broadberry (Nuffield College Oxford, CAGE and CEPR) |
| Abstract: | As a result of recent work on historical national accounting, it is now possible to establish more firmly the timing of the Great Divergence of living standards between Europe and Asia in the eighteenth century. There was a European Little Divergence as Britain and the Netherlands overtook Italy and Spain, and an Asian Little Divergence as Japan overtook China and India. The Great Divergence occurred because Japan grew more slowly than Britain and the Netherlands starting from a lower level, and because of a strong negative growth trend in Qing dynasty China. A growth accounting framework is used to assess the contributions of labour, human and physical capital, land and total factor productivity. In addition to these proximate sources, the roles of institutions and geography are examined as the ultimate sources of the divergent growth patterns. |
| Keywords: | Great Divergence; living standards; measurement; explanation JEL Classification: N10, N30, N35, O10, O57 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:549&r= |
| By: | Sur, Pramod Kumar (Osaka University); Sasaki, Masaru (Osaka University) |
| Abstract: | More than half a century has passed since the Great Chinese Famine (1959–1961), and China has transformed from a poor, underdeveloped country to the world's leading emerging economy. Does the effect of the famine persist today? To explore this question, we combine historical data on province-level famine exposure with contemporary data on individual wealth. To better understand if the relationship is causal, we simultaneously account for the well-known historical evidence on the selection effect arising for those who survive the famine and those born during this period, as well as the issue of endogeneity on the exposure of a province to the famine. We find robust evidence showing that famine exposure has had a considerable negative effect on the contemporary wealth of individuals born during this period. Together, the evidence suggests that the famine had an adverse effect on wealth, and it is even present among the wealthiest cohort of individuals in present-day China. |
| Keywords: | famine, wealth, persistence, China |
| JEL: | D31 O15 N35 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14291&r= |
| By: | Mitchener, Kris James (Santa Clara University, CAGE, CEPR, CES-ifo & NBER); Wandschneider, Kirsten (University of Vienna & CEPR); O’Rourke, Kevin Hjortshøj (NYU-Abu Dhabi, CEPR, NBER & CAGE) |
| Abstract: | We document the outbreak of a trade war after the U.S. adopted the Smoot-Hawley tariff in June 1930. U.S. trade partners initially protested the possible implementation of the sweeping tariff legislation, with many eventually choosing to retaliate by increasing their tariffs on imports from the United States. Using a new quarterly dataset on bilateral trade for 99 countries during the interwar period, we show that U.S. exports to countries that protested fell by between 15 and 22 percent, while U.S. exports to retaliators fell by 28-33 percent. Furthermore, using a second new dataset on U.S. exports at the product-level, we find that the most important U.S. exports to retaliating markets were particularly affected, suggesting a possible mechanism whereby the U.S. was targeted despite countries’ MFN obligations. The retaliators’ welfare gains from trade fell by roughly 8-17%. |
| Keywords: | Trade wars, gravity model, Smoot-Hawley, Great Depression, trade policy JEL Classification: F13, F14, N70 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:550&r= |
| By: | Ó Gráda, Cormac (University College Dublin & CAGE); O’Rourke, Kevin Hjortshøj (NYU Abu Dhabi & CAGE) |
| Abstract: | We provide a centennial overview of the Irish economy in the one hundred years following partition and independence. A comparative perspective allows us to distinguish between those aspects of Irish policies and performance that were unique to the country, and those which mirrored developments elsewhere. While Irish performance was typical in the long run, the country under-performed prior to the mid-1980s and overperformed for the rest of the twentieth century. Real growth after 2000 was slow. The mainly chronological narrative highlights the roles of convergence forces, trade and industrial policy, and monetary and fiscal policy. While the focus is mostly on the south of the island, we also survey the Northern Irish experience during this period. |
| Keywords: | Ireland, economic growth, living standards, trade policy, crises JEL Classification: N14 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:552&r= |
| By: | Kersting, Felix (HU Berlin); Wohnsiedler, Iris (HU Berlin); Wolf, Nikolaus (HU Berlin) |
| Abstract: | 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 19th 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 as well as IV mediation analysis. We suggest that this result is due to anti-Polish discrimination. |
| Keywords: | Max Weber; protestantism; nationalism; |
| JEL: | N13 N33 O16 Z12 |
| Date: | 2019–11–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rco:dpaper:199&r= |
| By: | Sascha O. Becker (SoDa Laboratories, Monash University); Francisco Pino (SoDa Laboratories, Monash University); Jordi Vidal-Robert (SoDa Laboratories, Monash University) |
| Abstract: | The Protestant Reformation in the early 16th century challenged the monopoly of the Catholic Church. The printing press helped the new movement spread its ideas well beyond the cradle of the Reformation in Luther’s city of Wittenberg. The Catholic Church reacted by issuing indexes of forbidden books which blacklisted not only Protestant authors but all authors whose ideas were considered to be in conflict with Catholic doctrine. We use newly digitized data on the universe of books censored by the Catholic Church during the Counter-Reformation, containing information on titles, authors, printers and printing locations. We classify censored books by topic (religion, sciences, social sciences and arts) and language and record when and where books were indexed. Our results show that Catholic censorship did reduce printing of forbidden authors, as intended, but also negatively impacted on the diffusion of knowledge, and city growth. |
| Keywords: | Censorship, Counter-Reformation, Elite Human Capital, Political Economy |
| JEL: | D7 N93 J24 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ajr:sodwps:2021-04&r= |
| By: | Felix Ward (Erasmus University Rotterdam); Yao Chen (Erasmus University Rotterdam); Nuno Palma (University of Manchester) |
| Abstract: | How did the Spanish money supply evolve in the aftermath of the discovery of large amounts of precious metals in Spanish America? We synthesize the available data on the mining of precious metals and their international flow to estimate the money supply for Spain from 1492 to 1810. Our estimate suggests that the Spanish money supply increased more than ten-fold. Viewed through the equation of exchange this money supply increase can account for most of the price level rise in early modern Spain. |
| Keywords: | early modern period, equation of exchange, quantity theory of money |
| JEL: | E31 E51 N13 |
| Date: | 2021–04–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tin:wpaper:20210033&r= |
| By: | Laurent Le Maux (University of Western Brittany) |
| Abstract: | Walter Bagehot (1873) published his famous book, Lombard Street, almost 150 years ago. The adage "lending freely against good collateral at a penalty rate" is associated with his name and his book has always been set on a pedestal and is still considered as the leading reference on the role of lender of last resort. Nonetheless, without a clear understanding of the theoretical grounds and the institutional features of the British banking system, any interpretation of Bagehot's writings remains vague if not misleading-which is worrisome if they are supposed to provide a guideline for policy makers. The purpose of the present paper is to determine whether Bagehot's recommendation remains relevant for modern central bankers or whether it was indigenous to the monetary and banking architecture of Victorian times. |
| Keywords: | Bagehot,Central Banking,Lender of Last Resort |
| Date: | 2021–04–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-03201509&r= |
| By: | Batiz-Lazo, Bernardo |
| Abstract: | This paper discusses the current state of historical research into entrepreneurship in Mexico |
| Keywords: | entrepreneur, Mexico, business history |
| JEL: | M13 N8 N80 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:107457&r= |
| By: | Suesse, Marvin (Trinity College Dublin); Wolf, Nikolaus (HU Berlin and CEPR) |
| Abstract: | What determines the development of rural financial markets? Starting from a simple theoretical framework, we derive the factors shaping the market entry of rural microfinance institutions across time and space. We provide empirical evidence for these determinants using the expansion of credit cooperatives in the 236 eastern counties of Prussia between 1852 and 1913. This setting is attractive as it provides a free market benchmark scenario without public ownership, subsidization, or direct regulatory intervention. Furthermore, we exploit features of our historical set-up to identify causal effects. The results show that declining agricultural staple prices, as a feature of structural transformation, leads to the emergence of credit cooperatives. Similarly, declining bank lending rates contribute to their rise. Low asset sizes and land inequality inhibit the regional spread of cooperatives, while ethnic heterogeneity has ambiguous effects. We also offer empirical evidence suggesting that credit cooperatives accelerated rural transformation by diversifying farm outputs. |
| Keywords: | microfinance; credit cooperatives; rural transformation; land inequality; prussia; |
| JEL: | G21 N23 O16 Q15 |
| Date: | 2019–12–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rco:dpaper:207&r= |
| By: | Howard, Greg (University of Illinois); Ornaghi, Arianna (University of Warwick) |
| Abstract: | How do different local policies in a federal system affect local land values, production, and sorting? We study the question exploiting a large historical policy change : U.S. Alcohol Prohibition in the early twentieth century. Comparing same-state early and late adopters of county dry laws in a difference-in-differences design, we find that early Prohibition adoption increased population and farm real estate values. Moreover, we find strong effects on farm productivity consistent with increased investment due to a land price channel. In equilibrium, the policy change disproportionately attracted immigrants and African-Americans. |
| Keywords: | Tiebout sorting ; migration ; land values ; productivity ; amenities ; credit JEL Classification: N91 ; R13 ; E22 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:1347&r= |
| By: | Renato P. Colistete |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the skills of enslaved labour during the second half of the nineteenth century in the province of São Paulo. The analysis is based on data from 3,376 individuals collected in advertisements of runaway slaves published by São Paulo newspapers between 1854 and 1887. As only a small part of the announcements listed runaways’ occupations, we draw on individual details on sex, age, ethnicity, residence, physical characteristics and other features of fugitives with advertised occupations to predict the skills of the remaining subset of runaways, using classification algorithms from machine learning. Overall, both observed and predicted skilled runaways converged in their characteristics: skilled runaways were mostly male, older than their low-skilled counterparts and predominantly from farms and plantations, rather than urban settings. Africans were not at a disadvantage in artisanal jobs when compared with Brazilian-born runaways, and the skill gap between mixed-race and black fugitives was negligible. Although the enslaved population suffered from very low levels of literacy, the few runaways with an ability to read or write tended to work in more qualified and artisanal occupations, indicating that education may have been valuable even under the appalling conditions of slavery. These results are important both for the analysis of slavery in Brazil and comparisons with other plantation societies in the Americas. |
| Keywords: | Slavery; Runaways; Skills; Skilled slaves; Machine learning; São Paulo; Brazil |
| JEL: | N3 N36 N5 N56 J24 |
| Date: | 2021–04–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:spa:wpaper:2021wpecon15&r= |
| By: | Becker, Sascha O. (Monash U, U Warwick and CAGE); Mukand, Sharun (University of Warwick and CAGE); Lindenthal, Volker (University of Munich); Waldinger, Fabian (University of Munich) |
| Abstract: | We study the role of professional networks in facilitating the escape of persecuted academics from Nazi Germany. From 1933, the Nazi regime started to dismiss academics of Jewish origin from their positions. The timing of dismissals created individual-level exogenous variation in the timing of emigration from Nazi Germany, allowing us to estimate the causal eect of networks for emigration decisions. Academics with ties to more colleagues who had emigrated in 1933 or 1934 (early émigrés) were more likely to emigrate. The early émigrés functioned as “bridging nodes†that helped other academics cross over to their destination. Furthermore, we provide some of the rst empirical evidence of decay in social ties over time. The strength of ties also decays across space, even within cities. Finally, for high-skilled migrants, professional networks are more important than community networks. |
| Keywords: | JEL Classification: |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:542&r= |
| By: | Becker, Sascha O. (Monash University); Mergele, Lukas (ifo Institute); Woessmann, Ludger (LMU Munich & ifo Institute) |
| Abstract: | German separation in 1949 into a communist East and a capitalist West and their reunification in 1990 are commonly described as a natural experiment to study the enduring effects of communism. We show in three steps that the populations in East and West Germany were far from being randomly selected treatment and control groups. First, the later border is already visible in many socio-economic characteristics in pre-World War II data. Second, World War II and the subsequent occupying forces affected East and West differently. Third, a selective fifth of the population fled from East to West Germany before the building of the Wall in 1961. In light of our findings, we propose a more cautious interpretation of the extensive literature on the enduring effects of communist systems on economic outcomes, political preferences, cultural traits, and gender roles. |
| Keywords: | political systems; communism; preferences; culture; Germany; |
| JEL: | D72 H11 P26 P36 N44 |
| Date: | 2020–03–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rco:dpaper:231&r= |
| By: | François Facchini (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | This bookreview presents the James C. Scott's thesis about the origin of State and discusses its relevance to the defense of the ethics of freedom. |
| Abstract: | Cette note de lecture présente la thèse défendue par James C. Scott puis discute de son intérêt pour les défenseurs de l'éthique de la liberté. |
| Keywords: | origine de l'Etat,blé,impôt,soumission,agriculture fugitive |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03195330&r= |
| By: | Priyaranjan Jha; Karan Talathi |
| Abstract: | We study the implications of two historical institutions, direct British rule, and the heterogeneous land tenure institutions implemented by the British, on disparity in present day development using district level data from India. Using nightlights per capita as a proxy for district level per capita income, we find that modern districts that were historically under direct British rule had 39.47% less nightlights per capita in 1993 relative to modern districts that were historically under indirect British rule. The large gap persists even after including other controls such as educational attainment, health, and physical infrastructure. Looking at the growth pattern during 1993 to 2013, directly ruled districts had a 1.84% lower annual growth rate compared to indirectly ruled districts. As well, directly ruled districts were converging at a rate of 2% per year while indirectly ruled districts were converging at a rate of 5.7% per year. Much of the development gap between areas under indirect rule and direct rule can be accounted for by the adverse effect of landlord-based revenue collection system in the directly ruled areas. |
| Keywords: | institutions, direct British rule, economic growth, nightlights per capita, land tenure system, economic development, human capital |
| JEL: | O11 O43 P16 P51 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9031&r= |
| By: | Thomas Palley (Economics for Democratic and Open Societies (US)) |
| Abstract: | Almost fifty years ago, the Swedish econographer Axel Leijonhufvud (1973) wrote a seminal study on the Econ tribe titled “Life among the Econ”. This study revisits the Econ and reports on their current state. Life has gotten more complicated since those bygone days. The cult of math modl-ing has spread far and wide, so that even lay Econs practice it. Fifty years ago the Econ used to say “Modl-ing is everything”. Now they say “Modl-ing is the only thing”. The math priesthood has been joined by a priesthood of economagicians. The fundamental social divide between Micro and Macro sub-tribes persists, but it has been diluted by a new doctrine of micro foundations. The Econ remain a fractious and argumentative tribe. |
| Keywords: | Micro, macro, economagicians, Keynesians, New Classicals, New Keynesians |
| JEL: | A10 B00 B20 Z00 Z10 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pke:wpaper:pkwp2106&r= |
| By: | Kersting, Felix (HU Berlin); Wolf, Nikolaus (HU Berlin) |
| Abstract: | What are the origins of national identity? We extend the model by Alesina et al. (2019) to analyze the incentives of elites to use specific types of identity policies in response to shocks, and the extent to which such policies should be effective. To elicit changes in identity we use data on first names given in German cities between 1800 and 1875. We show that parents in cities treated by nation building policies responded by choosing first names of German origin for their children. To control for familyspecific confounding factors, we exploit within family variation. We also show that the response can be conditional on cultural distance to the elite. Finally, Germanic first names had remarkable predictive power for behaviour. We find that individuals with Germanic first names made different marriage choices and were more likely to get actively involved and decorated during the German-French War in 1870/71 and the First World War. |
| Keywords: | ; |
| Date: | 2019–12–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rco:dpaper:217&r= |
| By: | Broadberry, Stephen (Nuffield College, Oxford and CAGE); de Pleijt, Alexandra M. (Utrecht University) |
| Abstract: | Estimates of capital formation and the stock of capital in Britain are provided for the period 1270-1870 and used to analyse economic growth. (1) We chart the growing importance of fixed relative to working capital, the declining importance of land and the growth of net overseas assets. (2) Kaldor’s stylised facts of a rising capital-labour ratio and a stationary capital-output ratio are broadly confirmed, but only if attention is confined to fixed capital. (3) Extensive form growth accounts suggest that output growth was driven largely by factor input growth, while intensive form growth accounts suggest that TFP growth was more important than capital deepening in explaining the growth of output per head. (4) The investment share of GDP increased substantially during the transition from pre-industrial to modern economic growth. |
| Keywords: | JEL Classification: |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:546&r= |
| By: | Takeshi SAKADE |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kue:epaper:e-21-001&r= |
| By: | Fenske, James (University of Warwick); Kala, Namrata (sloan school of management — massachusetts institute of technology); Wei, Jinlin (University of Warwick) |
| Abstract: | Using a new dataset on city populations in colonial India, we show that the railroad network increased city size in the period 1881 to 1931. Our baseline estimation approach includes fixed effects for city and year, and we construct instrumental variables for railroad proximity based on distance from a least cost path spanning cities that existed prior to the start of railroad construction. Cities that increased market access due to the railroad grew, particularly those cities that were initially small and isolated. |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:1349&r= |
| By: | Melander, Eric (University of Namur and CAGE); Miotto, Martina (CERGE-EI and CAGE) |
| Abstract: | The New Poor Law reform of 1834 induced dramatic and heterogeneous reductions in welfare spending across English and Welsh counties. Using the reform in a difference-in-differences instrumental variables strategy, we document a robust negative relationship between the generosity of welfare provision and criminal activity. Results are driven by non-violent property crimes and are stronger during months of seasonal agricultural unemployment, indicating that a combination of welfare cuts and precarious work opportunities lowered the opportunity cost of crime for economically vulnerable individuals. We use data on county police forces and individual-level criminal records to rule out alternative mechanisms related to changes in policing and sentencing. |
| Keywords: | welfare spending, austerity, crime, poor laws JEL Classification: H53, I38, K42, N33 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:548&r= |
| By: | Gordon John Anderson |
| Abstract: | The increasing similarity of male and female roles in the labour market over the last 50 years has been dubbed “The Grand Gender Convergence†, though there is concern that the process has stalled. In the absence of gender discrimination and assuming similar preferences for work and human resource acquisition across the gender divide, females and males with similar human resource characteristics should have similar income distributions in equilibrium, in effect there would be equality of opportunity across the gender divide. If that equilibrium is stable, convergence to the equilibrium state should see increasingly similar gender based income distributions accompanied by increasingly similar gender based human resource distributions. Viewed through the lens of an equal opportunity imperative, income convergence is a necessary, but not sufficient condition for a “Grand Gender Convergence†since similarities in income distributions could be achieved with gender based differences in human resources and efforts given a discriminatory rewards structure. Here, using new tools for empirically examining distributional convergence processes, the existence of a “Grand Gender Convergence†in 21st century Canada is examined in the context of such an Equal Opportunity paradigm. While income convergence is almost universally apparent, the same is not true for human resource stocks which appear to be diverging, raising questions about the existence of a Canadian Grand Gender convergence. |
| Keywords: | Gender, Convergence, Distributional Differences, Human Resources. |
| JEL: | J3 J16 J22 J24 J31 J33 N3 |
| Date: | 2021–04–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tor:tecipa:tecipa-694&r= |
| By: | Makoto Yano (Institute of Economic Reserch, Kyoto University and RIETI); Yuichi Furukawa (Aichi University and RIETI) |
| Abstract: | Between the 1760s and 1980s, we have experienced at least three industrial revolutions. We explain such cycles as ergodic chaos and relate it to the average long-run interest rate and intellectual property protection. Because innovation dynamics is intrinsically multi-dimensional, we need newly to develop a structural characterization of multi-dimensional ergodic chaos suitable for an economic analysis. Introducing such a characterization for the two-dimensional case, we show that if the monopolistic use of a new invention lasts eight years, an industrial-revolution-like burst of new technologies recurs about every one hundred years, given empirically reasonable values of the determinants of a long-run interest rate. |
| Keywords: | industrial revolutions, chaotic cycles, intellectual properties, market quality dynamics |
| JEL: | C62 E32 O41 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kyo:wpaper:1057&r= |
| By: | Vogt, Annette |
| Abstract: | Der Mathematiker und Statistiker E. J. Gumbel führte eine Doppelexistenz - als Mathematiker und Statistiker von 1923 bis zu seiner Vertreibung 1932 an der Universität Heidelberg und als politischer Autor. Auch im Exil in Frankreich behielt er diese Doppeltätigkeit bei, verfasste mathematische Arbeiten und publizierte Artikel gegen das NS-Regime in Exil-Zeitschriften. Sein Hauptwerk "Statistics of Extremes" erschien 1958 in New York (eine Reprint-Ausgabe 2013). Die "Wiederentdeckung" des "politischen Gumbel" begann 2012 und fast zeitgleich die "Wiederentdeckung" des "mathematischen Gumbel". Die Anwendungen der "Gumbel Distribution" und der Gumbel-Copula zur Modellierung stochastischer Abhängigkeiten weckten das Interesse an der Person Gumbel und seinen Leistungen. Im Artikel werden neue Forschungsergebnisse zu E. J. Gumbel vorgestellt. |
| Keywords: | Emil J. Gumbel (Mathematiker, Pazifist und politischer Autor) |
| JEL: | C00 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:irtgdp:2021009&r= |
| By: | Kristensen, Frederikke Frehr (University of Southern Denmark); Sharp, Paul (University of Southern Denmark and CAGE) |
| Abstract: | The importance of testing and reporting has frequently been stated during the COVID-19 pandemic, but studies on the effectiveness of surveillance are still lacking. We thus turn to the last great epidemic, HIV/AIDS. In 1985 the first blood test for HIV became available, but prior to 1996 no effective medical treatment was available. We exploit the differential rollout of HIV surveillance across US states between 1985 and 2008 and find that HIV reporting helped reduce both AIDS cases and mortality. After the introduction of the effective treatment, HAART, there is no longer a significant effect on mortality, but the effect on reducing cases remains. For blacks, however, the impact on mortality is apparent even after 1996. Surveillance is therefore an important tool for combating epidemics, even in the presence of effective treatments, perhaps due to its impact on the avoidance of risky behavior. |
| Keywords: | AIDS, HIV, surveillance, United States JEL Classification: I18, J18, N32 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cge:wacage:553&r= |