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on Business, Economic and Financial History |
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Issue of 2021‒05‒10
43 papers chosen by |
| By: | Palma, Nuno Pedro G.; Reis, Jaime Brown; Rodrigues, Lisbeth |
| Abstract: | Gender discrimination has been pointed out as a determining factor behind the long-run divergence in incomes of Southern vis-a-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: | Comparative development; Culture; European Marriage Pattern; gender wage gap; Historical gender discrimination; Social norms; the Little Divergence |
| JEL: | J16 N13 N33 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15922&r= |
| By: | Prados de la Escosura, Leandro |
| Abstract: | The study of international well-being and its distribution remains focused on income. This paper addresses multidimensional well-being from a capabilities perspective during the last one-and-a-half centuries. Relative inequality (population-weighted) fell in health and education since the late 1920s, due to the globalisation of mass schooling and the health transition, but only dropped from 1970 onwards in terms of political and civil liberties, and declined since 1900 for augmented human development. These results are at odds with per capita income inequality that rose over time and only shrank from 1990 onwards. Relative and absolute well-being distribution behaved differently, with the distance between countries shrinking in relative terms but widening in absolute terms. Countries in the middle and lower deciles of the world distribution achieved the largest relative gain over the last century. Education and political and civil liberties were the main contributors to the evolution of augmented human development inequality, although longevity made a substantial contribution until the 1920s |
| Keywords: | Augmented Human Development; Civil and Political Liberties; GDP; inequality; Life Expectancy; schooling; Well-being |
| JEL: | I00 N30 O15 O50 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15853&r= |
| By: | Broadberry, Stephen N |
| 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: | explanation; Great Divergence; living standards; Measurement |
| JEL: | N10 N30 N35 O10 O57 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15936&r= |
| By: | Nekoei, Arash; Sinn, Fabian |
| Abstract: | We document the evolution of women's status across the globe and throughout recorded history. We first construct a new database of seven million notable individuals (Human Biographical Record). We then measure women's status as women's share among the most prominent fraction of population that allows comparison across time and space. The records show no long-run trend in women's share in recorded history. Historically, women's power has been a side-effect of nepotism: the more important family connections, the higher the women's share. But self-made women began to rise among the writers in the 17th century before a broader take off started with the 1800 birth cohort: first among artists and scholars, followed by elected politicians, and finally appointed politicians. The first wave among writers emerged when informal humanist education and new public spheres shaped a supply of literary women, who met the demand of a new female reading public. A strong writer wave predicts a stronger takeoff of self-made women in the 19th century. This effect has persisted and created cross-country divergence. |
| Keywords: | Big Data; Women emancipation |
| JEL: | I24 J16 N00 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15736&r= |
| By: | Ma, Debin |
| Abstract: | What explains economic changes or lack-thereof in modern China during 1850-1950? This paper highlights the critical role of ideology and ideological change induced as a response to Western impact following Qing China's forced opening during the mid-19th century. I argue that Imperial Qing's highly centralized and absolutist political regimes and traditional dominance in a China-centred world order have led to a closure of mind to new intellectual resources and initial failure to recognize impending crisis in the new world order. By laying out the quantitative profile of Chinese economic change during 1850-1950 and reviewing the main historiography, this paper builds a new analytical framework linking ideology with economic changes. It delineates three phases of economic changes in light of the specific timing of intellectual and ideological transformation during this period and embed our narrative with two specific cases of commercial and financial developments. |
| Keywords: | Ideology; institutions; Meiji China; Qing China; Western impact and Chinese response |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15835&r= |
| By: | Becker, Sascha O.; Lindenthal, Volker; Mukand, Sharun; Waldinger, Fabian |
| 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 effect 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 first 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: | High-Skilled Emigration; Jewish Academics; Nazi Germany; Professional Networks; Universities |
| JEL: | I20 I23 I28 J15 J24 N30 N34 N40 N44 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15820&r= |
| By: | Esposito, Elena; Rotesi, Tiziano; Saia, Alessandro; Thoenig, Mathias |
| Abstract: | We study how the spread of the Lost Cause narrative -a revisionist and racist retelling of the US Civil War- shifted both opinions and behaviors toward reunifying the country and racially alienating African Americans. Drawing on a large set of archival data from between 1910 and 1920, we reconstitute a monthly record of the staggered screenings across US counties of The Birth of a Nation, a blockbuster movie that popularized the Lost Cause narrative across large segments of the population. Our empirical analysis shows that the movie induced (i) a semantic shift in the public discourse toward more patriotic and less divisive language on post-Civil War nation building; (ii) a surge in patriotism with an increased enlistment rate in the US military; and (iii) a cultural convergence between former Confederate and Unionist states with a rise in the adoption of first names traditionally associated with the former enemy's regional identity. We go on to document how the racist content of the narrative helped foster reconciliation through a common enemy rhetorical argument. While we find that the movie strengthened discrimination against African Americans in public discourse and the labor market, our quantitative estimates suggest that 55% of the total effect of the movie on reconciliation was indirectly mediated precisely through this rise in discrimination. All of our findings are detected within both former Confederate and Unionist states. |
| Keywords: | African Americans; narratives; Reconciliation; Segregation; US Civil War |
| JEL: | D74 N92 Z1 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15938&r= |
| By: | Bisin, Alberto; Federico, Giovanni |
| Abstract: | The relationship between history and economics as academic disciplines is methodologically subtle and sociologically contested. If the Cliometric revolution can be characterized as an acquisition of economics by history, the most recent trends in Historical Economics appear to turn this relationship on its head. In this Introduction we read the chapters of the Handbook as a forceful argument in favor of a merger between the two disciplines rather than the acquisition of one by the other; a merger which combines, notably, the detailed knowledge of historical sources, the capability of distilling complex historical processes into a model, and the statistical/econometric skills for identification and estimation. |
| Keywords: | Cliometrics; economic history; persistence studies |
| JEL: | B40 N00 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15795&r= |
| By: | Wehrheim, Lino; Jopp, Tobias Alexander; Spoerer, Mark |
| Abstract: | The increasing availability of digital text collections and the corresponding establishment of methods for computer-assisted analysis open up completely new perspectives on historical textual sources. In this paper, we use the possibilities of text mining to investigate the history of German historiography. The aim of the paper is to use topic models, i.e. methods of automated content analysis, to explore publication trends within German historiography since the end of World War II and, thus, to gain data-based insights into the history of the discipline. For this purpose, we evaluate a text corpus consisting of more than 9,000 articles from eleven leading historiographical journals. The following questions are addressed: (1) Which research subjects mattered, and in how far did this change over time? (2) In how far does this change reflect historiographical paradigm shifts, or 'turns'? (3) Do the data allow to map the emergence of these turns, i.e., can we periodize/historicize them? (4) Which of the proclaimed turns mattered in the sense that it is actually reflected in the research themes we find, and which turn does not? |
| Keywords: | German historiography,cultural turn,digital history,topic modelling |
| JEL: | B40 N01 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:pp1859:31&r= |
| By: | Dellas, Harris; Tavlas, George |
| Abstract: | We discuss the evolution of the debate on policy rules vs discretion. Doctrinal historians place the starting point of the debate in the nineteenth-century controversy between the Currency and Banking Schools in Britain. We establish that this controversy was not about discretion but about the degree of activism under a single rule -- that of the gold standard. The rules vs discretion issue originated with Henry Simons and the Chicago School in the 1930s, and came to center stage following the Great Inflation in the 1970s. Both the 1930s and 1970s literatures were triggered by monetary-policy failures. The modern literature's main innovations concern its (1) comparison of discretion to optimal policy rather than just to rules, (2) shift of focus to benevolent governments that lack commitment, (3) demonstration of discretion's inefficiencies in both stochastic and deterministic environments, and (4) support of activistic policy rules. |
| Keywords: | Banking School; Chicago School; Currency School; Modern debate; monetary policy; Rules Versus Discretion |
| JEL: | B22 E52 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15976&r= |
| By: | Mitchener, Kris James; O'Rourke, Kevin Hjortshøj; Wandschneider, Kirsten |
| 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: | Smoot-Hawley; Trade; Trade War |
| JEL: | F14 N72 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15952&r= |
| By: | Gagliarducci, Stefano; Tabellini, Marco |
| Abstract: | We study the effects of religious organizations on immigrants' assimilation. We focus on the arrival of Italian Catholic churches in the US between 1900 and 1920, when four million Italians had moved to America, and anti-Catholic sentiments were widespread. We combine newly collected Catholic directories on the presence of Italian churches across years and counties with the full count US Census of Population. We find that Italian churches reduced the social assimilation of Italian immigrants, lowering intermarriage rates and increasing ethnic residential segregation. We find no evidence that this was the result of either lower effort exerted by immigrants to ``fit in'' the American society or increased desire to vertically transmit national culture. Instead, we provide evidence for other two, non-mutually exclusive, mechanisms. First, Italian churches raised the frequency of interactions among fellow Italians, likely generating peer effects and reducing contact with other groups. Second, they increased the salience of the immigrant community among natives, thereby triggering backlash and discrimination. |
| Keywords: | Assimilation; Immigration; religious organizations |
| JEL: | J15 N31 Z12 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15794&r= |
| By: | Monnet, Eric; Puy, Damien |
| Abstract: | We estimate world cycles using a new quarterly macro-financial dataset assembled using IMF archives, covering a large set of countries since 1950. World cycles, real and financial, exist and US shocks drive them. But their strength is modest for GDP and credit. Global financial cycles are much weaker for credit than for asset prices. We also challenge the view that synchronization has increased with globalization. Although this is true for prices (goods and assets), it is not for quantities (output and credit). World business and credit cycles were as strong during Bretton Woods (1950-1972) as during the Globalization period (1982-2006). We investigate the economic and financial forces driving our results, connect them to the existing literature and discuss important policy implications. |
| Keywords: | business cycles; financial cycles; Financial Integration; Globalization; trade integration; US Monetary Policy; World Cycles |
| JEL: | E32 F41 F42 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15958&r= |
| By: | Castaneda Dower, Paul; Gokmen, Gunes; Le Breton, Michel; Weber, Shlomo |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the lasting impact of the alignment of African countries during the Cold War on modern economic development. We show that the division of the continent into two blocs (East/West) led to two clusters of development outcomes that reflect the Cold War's ideological divide. To determine alignment, we introduce a non-cooperative game of social interactions between African countries, where every country chooses one of two existing blocs based on its predetermined bilateral similarities with other members of the bloc. We show the existence of a strong Nash equilibrium in our game and apply the celebrated MaxCut method to identify such a partition. We validate the alignment by confirming that it predicts UN General Assembly voting patterns during the Cold War. Our approach, linking global political interdependence to distinct development paths in Africa, extracts from history a micro-founded, exogenous treatment, while allowing for an endogenous, process-oriented view of historical events. |
| Keywords: | Africa; blocs; Cold War; Development Clusters; Landscape theory; Political Alliances; Strong Nash Equilibrium |
| JEL: | C62 C72 F54 F55 N47 O19 O57 Y10 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15810&r= |
| By: | Beltrán Tapia, Francisco; Gruber, Siegfried; Ogórek, Bartosz; Szoltysek, Mikolaj |
| Abstract: | The topic of "missing girls" in historical Europe has not only been mostly neglected, but previous research addressing this issue usually took the available information too lightly, either rejecting or accepting the claims that there was discrimination against female children, without assessing the possibility that the observed child sex ratios could be attributable to chance, mortality differentials, or registration quality. This article contributes to this discussion by (1) using a novel dataset of historical child sex ratios that covers a large part of the European geography between 1700 and 1950; and (2) explicitly considering the effects of random variability, demographic variation, and faulty enumeration in the analysis. Our results provide evidence that some of these European populations had child sex ratios well above the levels usually considered "natural". Although part of this variation is indeed shown to be due to random noise and structural features related to infant mortality differentials and census quality, some of the observed sex ratios are too high to be attributed solely to these proximate factors. Thus, these findings suggest that there are behavioural explanations for some of the unbalanced sex ratios observed in our data. |
| Keywords: | Gender Discrimination; health; Infant and child mortality; Sex ratios |
| JEL: | I14 I15 J13 J16 N33 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15818&r= |
| By: | Broadberry, Stephen N; de Pleijt, Alexandra |
| 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: | Britain; Capital; economic growth; Long Run |
| JEL: | N13 N33 O10 O47 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15889&r= |
| By: | Michel Garenne (FERDI - Fondation pour les Etudes et Recherches sur le Développement International, IRD - Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Institut Pasteur - Épidémiologie des Maladies Émergentes - Paris, WITS - University of the Witwatersrand [Johannesburg]) |
| Abstract: | L'étude porte sur les tendances de la mortalité au Burkina-Faso depuis l'indépendance, et tout particulièrement celles des jeunes enfants (0-4 ans) et des jeunes adultes (15-49 ans). Dans un premier temps elle résume les données recueillies lors des principales opérations démographiques conduites au niveau national : deux enquêtes démographiques (EDN) de 1961 et 1991 ; quatre recensements de population (RGPH) de 1975, 1985, 1996, et 2006 ; quatre enquêtes démographiques et de santé (DHS) de 1993, 1999, 2003, et 2010 ; et deux enquêtes sur les indicateurs du paludisme (MIS) de 2014 et 2018. Dans un second temps elle propose une reconstruction fine des tendances de la mortalité des jeunes enfants, et une analyse spécifique des trois périodes d'inversion de tendance : 1972-1974, 1982-1984, et 1991-2006. Les résultats montrent une baisse impressionnante de la mortalité entre 1960 et 2018, en milieu urbain comme en milieu rural, chez les jeunes enfants comme chez les jeunes adultes. La première période de crise montre une surmortalité, associée à la sécheresse du début des années 1970 et à la baisse des revenus concomitante. Il en va de même pour la seconde période de crise, elle aussi associée à la sécheresse du début des années 1980 et à une baisse des revenus. La troisième période est plus longue et montre une surmortalité probablement associée d'abord au sida mais aussi aux difficultés économiques du début des années 1990. Dans l'ensemble le pays semble assez résilient aux périodes de crise, et la mortalité récupère rapidement les tendances précédentes après les crises, probablement grâce à une aide internationale importante. Cependant, la période récente (2010-2019) reste mal connue du fait de l'absence de données précises, et l'épidémie de Covid-19 pourrait compliquer la situation après 2020. |
| Date: | 2021–04–27 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-03209352&r= |
| By: | Michaël Assous (UL2 UFR SEG - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UFR de Sciences économiques et de gestion - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2, TRIANGLE - Triangle : action, discours, pensée politique et économique - ENS Lyon - École normale supérieure - Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - IEP Lyon - Sciences Po Lyon - Institut d'études politiques de Lyon - Université de Lyon - UJM - Université Jean Monnet [Saint-Étienne] - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Vincent Carret (UL2 UFR SEG - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - UFR de Sciences économiques et de gestion - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2, TRIANGLE - Triangle : action, discours, pensée politique et économique - ENS Lyon - École normale supérieure - Lyon - UL2 - Université Lumière - Lyon 2 - IEP Lyon - Sciences Po Lyon - Institut d'études politiques de Lyon - Université de Lyon - UJM - Université Jean Monnet [Saint-Étienne] - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | In 1930, Ludwig Hamburger published in Dutch an article on the possibility to account for "economic instability" by using relaxation oscillations, a model of nonlinear vibrations which had recently been developed by the physicist Balthazar van der Pol. Hamburger's article, translated in French in 1931, attracted a strong interest in the nascent Econometric Society and in particular from Ragnar Frisch and François Divisia, who decided to make it one of the theme of the first European meeting of the Econometric Society, scheduled in Lausanne in 1931. Although Hamburger did not provide an economic theory going beyond the analogy with van der Pol's equation, he did propose to integrate shocks in his models in a manner that was completely different from what came after him. His approach was however shunned by other economists because its potentialities were not understood for at least three reasons. It took two decades before Richard Goodwin, spurred by the same physicist that was present at the early meetings of the Econometric Society, finally managed to build a convincing economic model relying on nonlinear oscillations. |
| Keywords: | Relaxation equation,Hamburger,van der Pol,le Corbeiller,economic instability,pendulum,self-sustained oscillations |
| Date: | 2021–04–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-03206795&r= |
| By: | Calderon, Alvaro (Stanford University); Fouka, Vasiliki (Stanford University); Tabellini, Marco (Harvard Business School) |
| Abstract: | Between 1940 and 1970 more than 4 million African Americans moved from the South to the North of the United States, during the Second Great Migration. This same period witnessed the struggle and eventual success of the civil rights movement in ending institutionalized racial discrimination. This paper shows that the Great Migration and support for civil rights are causally linked. Predicting Black inflows with a version of the shift-share instrument, we find that the Great Migration increased support for the Democratic Party and encouraged pro-civil rights activism in northern and western counties. These effects were driven by both Black and white voters, and were stronger in counties with a lower history of discrimination and with a larger working class and unionized white population. Mirroring the changes in the electorate, non-southern Congress members became more likely to promote civil rights legislation. Yet, these average effects mask heterogeneity in the behavior of legislators, who grew increasingly polarized along party lines on racial issues. Overall, our findings indicate that the Great Migration promoted Black political empowerment outside the South. They also suggest that, under certain conditions, cross-race coalitions can be major drivers of social and political change. |
| Keywords: | diversity, civil rights, great migration, race |
| JEL: | D72 J15 N92 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14312&r= |
| By: | Magud, Nicolas; Spilimbergo, Antonio |
| Abstract: | We analyze the institutional and economic consequences of populism in Latin America in the last 50 years. Populist regimes weaken institutions and macroeconomic (fiscal, monetary, and external) indicators, resulting in crises and worse income distribution. The duration of populist regimes depends on favorable external conditions. In particular, the commodity super-cycle of the 2000s and easy financing conditions allowed populists to stay in power longer than in past episodes. |
| Keywords: | Commodity supercycle; institutions; Latin America; political economy; populism |
| JEL: | E0 N1 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15824&r= |
| By: | Ariane Dupont Kieffer (PHARE - Pôle d'Histoire de l'Analyse et des Représentations Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - UPN - Université Paris Nanterre - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Sylvie Rivot (BETA - Bureau d'Économie Théorique et Appliquée - UL - Université de Lorraine - UNISTRA - Université de Strasbourg - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement); Jean Loup Madre (AME-DEST - Dynamiques Economiques et Sociales des Transports - Université Gustave Eiffel) |
| Abstract: | The golden age of road demand modeling began in the 1950s and flourished in the 1960s in the face of major road construction needs. These macro-models as well as the econometrics and the data to be processed, were mainly provided by engineers. A division of tasks can be observed between the engineers in charge of estimating the flows within the network, and the transport economists in charge of managing these flows once they are on the road network. Yet the inability to explain their decision-making processes and individual drives gave some room to economists to introduce economic analysis, so as to better understand individual or collective decisions between transport alternatives. Economists, in particular McFadden, began to offer methods to improve the measure of utility linked to transport, and to inform the engineering approach. This paper explores the challenges to the boundaries between economics and engineering in road demand analysis. |
| Keywords: | Modèle 4 étapes,Demande routière,Histoire des modèles de transport,Utilité marginale |
| Date: | 2021–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03209945&r= |
| By: | Cuberes, David; Desmet, Klaus; Rappaport, Jordan |
| Abstract: | Does a location's growth benefit or suffer from being geographically close to large economic centers? Spatial proximity may lead to competition and hurt growth, but it may also improve market access and enhance growth. Using data on U.S. counties and metro areas for the period 1840-2017, we document this tradeoff between urban shadows and urban access. Proximity to large urban centers was negatively associated with growth between 1840 and 1920, and positively associated with growth after 1920. Using a two-city spatial model, we show that the secular evolution of inter-city and intra-city commuting costs can account for this. Alternatively, the long-run decline in inter-city shipping costs relative to intra-city commuting costs is also consistent with these observed patterns. |
| Keywords: | 1840-2017; City Growth; commuting; spatial economics; United States; urban access; urban shadows; Urban systems |
| JEL: | N91 N92 R11 R12 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15807&r= |
| By: | Jacks, David S.; Stürmer, Martin |
| Abstract: | We provide evidence on the dynamic effects of fuel price shocks, shipping demand shocks, and shipping supply shocks on real dry bulk freight rates in the long run. We first analyze a new dataset on dry bulk freight rates for the period from 1850 to 2020, finding that they followed a downward but undulating path with a cumulative decline of 79%. Next, we turn to understanding the drivers of booms and busts in the dry bulk shipping industry, finding that shipping demand shocks strongly dominate all others as drivers of real dry bulk freight rates in the long run. Furthermore, while shipping demand shocks have increased in importance over time, shipping supply shocks in particular have become less relevant. |
| Keywords: | Dry bulk; maritime freight rates; structural VAR |
| JEL: | E30 N70 R40 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15956&r= |
| By: | Basco, Sergi; Domenech, Jordi; Rosés, Joan R. |
| Abstract: | The outburst of deaths and cases of Covid-19 around the world has renewed the interest to understand the mortality effects of pandemics across regions, occupations, age and gender. The Spanish Flu is the closest pandemic to Covid-19. Mortality rates in Spain were among the largest in today's developed countries. Our research documents a substantial heterogeneity on mortality rates across occupations. The highest mortality was on low-income workers. We also record a rural mortality penalty that reversed the historical urban penalty temporally. The higher capacity of certain social groups to isolate themselves from social contact could explain these mortality differentials. However, adjusting mortality evidence by these two factors, there were still large mortality inter-provincial differences for the same occupation and location, suggesting the existence of a regional component in rates of flu contagion possibly related to climatic differences. |
| Keywords: | Health inequality; Pandemics; Socio-Economic Mortality Differences; Urban Penalty |
| JEL: | I14 J1 N34 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15783&r= |
| By: | Bruno T. Rocha; Patrícia C. Melo; Nuno Afonso; João de Abreu e Silva |
| Abstract: | Portugal moved from having less than 200 km of motorways before joining the European Union in 1986 to having the fifth highest motorway density relative to population in the Union in 2017. This paper studies the relationship between the expansion of the Portuguese motorway network between 1981 and 2011 and the growth of population and employment in the 275 mainland municipalities of the country. We address the endogeneity of the geography of motorways using instrumental variables based on historical transport networks from 1800 and 1945. Our findings suggest that, on average, new motorways caused large increases in both population and employment. In line with existing evidence for other countries, we find that motorways contributed to suburbanisation, as the impact of motorways on population growth (but not on employment growth) is particularly strong in suburban municipalities. In addition, motorways also appear to have influenced urban agglomeration dynamics, as their effect on population growth depends positively on the municipality’s population size in 1970. |
| Keywords: | transport infrastructure, motorways, population redistribution, employment, suburbanisation, instrumental variables. |
| JEL: | O18 R11 R49 R58 |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ise:remwps:wp01742021&r= |
| By: | Gerlach, Stefan; Stuart, Rebecca |
| Abstract: | We study co-movements of inflation in a group of 15 countries before and during the classical Gold Standard by fitting a generalisation of the Ciccarelli-Mojon (2010) model on annual data spanning 1851-1913. We find that international inflation functions as an "attractor" for domestic inflation rates. The cross-sectional dispersion of inflation declined gradually over the sample and Bai-Perron tests for structural breaks at unknown points in time suggest that there are breaks in six of reduced-form inflation equations. However, sub-sample estimates indicate that the overall finding that international inflation is an important influence on domestic inflation. |
| Keywords: | Factor Analysis; gold standard; international inflation; principal components |
| JEL: | E31 F40 N10 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15914&r= |
| By: | Kohnert, Dirk |
| Abstract: | Throughout history, nothing has killed more human beings than infectious diseases. Although, death rates from pandemics dropped globally by about 0.8 % per year, all the way through the 20th century, the number of new infectious diseases like Sars, HIV and Covid-19 increased by nearly fourfold over the past century. In Africa, there were reported a total of 4,522,489 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 119,816 death, as of 23 April 2021. The pandemic impacted seriously on the economic and social sectors in almost all African countries. It is threatening to push up to 58 m people into extreme poverty. However, apart from the African poor, the Covid pandemic also affects the growing African middle class, i.e. about 170 million out of Africa’s 1.3 billion people currently classified as middle class. Nearly eight million of may be thrust into poverty because of the coronavirus and its economic aftermath. This setback will be felt for decades to come. Moreover, in recent African History also other infectouse diseases like the 1896–1906 Congo Basin Trypanosomiasis with a death-toll of over 500.000 as well as the 1900–1920 Uganda African trypanosomiasis epidemic with 200,000–300,000 death had tremendous negative impact on Africa’s societies and economies. Actually, other pandemics, like Yellow Fever, Cholera, Meningitis and Measles – not to mention Malaria - contributed to long-lasting economic downturns and seriously affect the social wellbeing for decades. |
| Keywords: | COVID-19, Corona pandemic, pandemics, Africa, socio-economic impact, migration, poverty, violence, ethics in epidemics, ethics dumping, African Studies, Post-Colonialism, |
| JEL: | D63 D74 E24 E26 F15 F22 F35 F52 F54 H12 H51 I14 I15 J46 N37 N97 O17 O55 Z1 |
| Date: | 2021–05–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:107561&r= |
| By: | Peter Temin (Center for Economic and Policy Research) |
| Abstract: | President Nixon replaced President Johnson's War on Poverty with his War on Drugs in 1971. This new drug war was expanded by President Reagan and others to create mass incarceration. The United States currently has a higher percentage of its citizens incarcerated than any other industrial country. Although Blacks are only 13 percent of the population, they are 40 percent of the incarcerated. The literatures on the causes and effects of mass incarceration are largely distinct, and I combine them to show the effects of mass incarceration on racial integration. Racial prejudice produced mass incarceration, and mass incarceration now retards racial integration. |
| Keywords: | mass incarceration, War on Drugs, racism, neighborhood effects, Head Start |
| JEL: | J15 H72 K14 N11 |
| Date: | 2021–04–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:thk:wpaper:inetwp155&r= |
| By: | Jia, Ruixue; Roland, Gérard; Xie, Yang |
| Abstract: | Despite a large consensus among economists on the strong interdependence and synergy between pro-development institutions, how should one understand why Imperial China, with weaker rule of law and property rights, gave the commoners more opportunities to access elite status than Premodern Europe, for example via the civil service exam and the absence of hereditary titles? Supported by rich historical narratives, we show that these institutional differences reflect more general differences in the power structure of society: (1) the Ruler enjoyed weaker absolute power in Europe; (2) the People were more on par with the Elites in China in terms of power and rights. Based on these narratives, we build a game-theoretical model and analyze how the power structure can shape the stability of an autocratic rule. If we read greater absolute power of the Ruler as conditioning more of the power and rights of the ruled on the Ruler's will, we show that a more symmetric Elite-People relationship can stabilize autocratic rule. If absolute power is stronger, this stabilizing effect will be stronger, and the Ruler's incentive to promote such symmetry will be greater. The theory explains the power structure differences between Imperial China and Premodern Europe, as well as specific institutions such as the bureaucracy in China and the role of cities in Europe. It is also consistent with the observation that autocratic rule was more stable in Imperial China than in Premodern Europe. |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15700&r= |
| By: | Eichengreen, Barry |
| Abstract: | South Africa was one of the fastest growing economies of the 1930s. This paper seeks to identify the roots of this macroeconomic outperformance and reconcile it with the country's delayed departure from the gold standard, such departure having typically been the event inaugurating recovery from the slump. It emphasizes South Africa's dependence on gold production, which gave the economy an additional boost from currency depreciation, over and above that felt in other countries, when depreciation finally took place. This highlights the paradox of South African policy makers' resistance to currency depreciation, as epitomized by the report of the Select Committee on the Gold Standard in 1932. |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15812&r= |
| By: | Brzezinski, Michal |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates how previous major pandemic events affected economic and gender inequalities in the short- to medium run. We consider the impact of six major pandemic episodes – H3N2 Flu (1968), SARS (2003), H1N1 Swine Flu (2009), MERS (2012), Ebola (2014), and Zika (2016) – on cross-country inequalities in a sample of up to 180 countries observed over 1950-2019. Results show that the past pandemics have moderately increased income inequality in the affected countries in the period of four to five years after the pandemic’s start. On the other hand, we do not find any robust negative impacts on wealth inequality. The results concerning gender inequality are less consistent, but we find some evidence of declining gender equality among the hardest hit countries, as well as of growing gender gaps in unemployment within the four years after the onset of the pandemic. |
| Date: | 2021–04–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:osfxxx:zc8gy&r= |
| By: | Wehrheim, Lino |
| Abstract: | One way for economists to influence economic policy and society as a whole is to shape what Robert Shiller has called "economic narratives". This, in turn, puts the media in their role as professional storytellers in a central position. In this paper, I investigate how economists have been covered by the media in a long-term perspective. Particularly, I address two questions: How has the quantitative visibility of economists in the media developed over time? And how can news stories covering economists be characterized in terms of their content? I answer these questions in two steps. First, I provide a comparison of economists' quantitative media visibility in international newspapers. Second, building on a corpus of more than 12,000 newspaper articles, I conduct a case study on the German Council of Economic Experts. Using various text mining approaches, I survey four features of newspaper coverage: topics, tonality, temporal perspective, and the role of individuals. Finally, based on extensive close reading, I briefly discuss two key turning points in the media history of economists, namely the 1980s and the late 1990s/early 2000s. The main finding is that economists have indeed become silent compared to their heyday of economic expertise in the 1960s, but that they have not been as silent as is often claimed. |
| Keywords: | economic experts,economic narratives,media analysis,topic modelling,sentiment analysis |
| JEL: | N01 P16 Z13 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:pp1859:30&r= |
| By: | Goodhart, Charles A; Masciandaro, Donato; Ugolini, Stefano |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses the monetary policy that the Most Serene Republic of Venice implemented in the years of calamities using a modern equivalent of helicopter money, precisely an extraordinary money issuing, coupled with capital losses for the issuer. We consider the 1629 famine and the 1630-1631 plague as a negative macroeconomic shock that the incumbent government addressed using fiscal monetization. Consolidating the balance sheets of the Mint and of the Giro Bank, and having heterogenous citizens â?? inequality matters - we show that the Republic implemented what was, in effect, helicopter money driven by political economy reasons, in order to avoid popular riots. |
| Keywords: | central banking; Helicopter money; monetary policy; Pandemic; Venice 1630 |
| JEL: | D7 E5 E6 N1 N2 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15715&r= |
| By: | Yury Fogelson (National Research University Higher School of Economics); Dmitry Poldnikov (National Research University Higher School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The rule of law, understood as ideology and legal rules, is believed to be a competitive advantage of Western civilization, supporting its sustainable development. Yet it can also be viewed as a social norm of citizens who respect the law and follow its commands. How does this social norm emerge in different societies? This question must be answered through the social history of the law in Western and non-Western societies from a comparative perspective. This paper outlines the main features of comparative socio-legal history and tests it on some significant historical examples. In the first part of the article, the authors propose a functional classification of legal systems into three ideal Weberian types—the law of judges, learned law, and the law of the authorities. It allows us to consider the origin of the social norm of the rule of law. In the second part of the article, the authors trace the transition from the ideal types to natural legal systems and identify the factors that determine the stability of the social norm of the rule of law where it originated. In the final part of the article, the authors conclude that, first, the social norm of the rule of law emerged in the societies where the law had been treated either as a means of resolving disputes (the law of judges) or as the rules of fair, correct conduct (learned law), for example, the Roman Republic, medieval England, continental Europe, and the Ottoman Empire. Secondly, the stability of the social norm of the rule of law seems to be explained by a "triangle" of factors, namely: 1) political competition where all participants understand the inevitability of compromise on the basis of the law, 2) law which is suitable for finding a compromise due to its internal merits, 3) a professional community of jurists who develop and apply law independently of the administration. Such a triangle is possible in any society where the law of judges or learned law prevails and where the majority of participants in the political process are ready to compromise based on the current law. |
| Keywords: | rule of law, social norm, comparative socio-legal history, law of judges, learned law, law of the authorities |
| JEL: | K K K |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:98/law/2021&r= |
| By: | Bisin, Alberto; Rubin, Jared; Seror, Avner; Verdier, Thierry |
| Abstract: | Recent theories of the Long Divergence between Middle Eastern and Western European economies focus on Middle Eastern (over-)reliance on religious legitimacy, use of slave soldiers, and persistence of restrictive proscriptions of religious (Islamic) law. These theories take as exogenous the cultural values that complement the prevailing institutions. As a result, they miss the role of cultural values in either supporting the persistence of or inducing change in the economic and institutional environment. In this paper, we address these issues by modeling the joint evolution of institutions and culture. In doing so, we place the various hypotheses of economic divergence into one, unifying framework. We highlight the role that cultural transmission plays in reinforcing institutional evolution toward either theocratic or secular states. We extend the model to shed light on political decentralization and technological change in the two regions. |
| Keywords: | cultural transmission; institutions; Legitimacy; Long Divergence; religion |
| JEL: | N34 N35 O10 O33 P16 P48 Z12 |
| Date: | 2021–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15802&r= |
| By: | Frodermann, Corinna (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]); Schmucker, Alexandra (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]); Seth, Stefan (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]); Vom Berge, Philipp (Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung (IAB), Nürnberg [Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg, Germany]) |
| Abstract: | "This data report describes the Sample of Integrated Labour Market Biographies (SIAB) 1975 - 2019." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en)) Additional Information DOI: 10.5164/IAB.FDZD.2101.en.v1 Frequencies and labels auch in Deutsch erschienen FDZ-Datenreport , 01/2021 (de) |
| Date: | 2021–04–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iab:iabfda:202101_en&r= |
| By: | Kim Oosterlinck; Anne-Sophie Radermecker |
| Abstract: | We study the effect of public regulation of the art market. In 1981, France passed a Decree to regulate attribution practices, in a market where authenticity plays a key role in valuation and price formation mechanisms. By using empirical evidence from sales of early Flemish paintings (1955-2015), we show that the decree had a limited impact not only on due diligence and attribution practices but also on value of sales. The size and relative depth of the French art market compared to other countries, as well as the development of technical art history, the globalization of the art market, and compliance mechanisms explain the moderate impact of this Decree on old master sales. Our results therefore suggest that to regulate attribution in the arts, market mechanisms might be more effective than regulation. |
| Keywords: | Art Market; Authenticity; Reputation; French Regulation; Marcus Decree |
| JEL: | K20 Z11 |
| Date: | 2021–04–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sol:wpaper:2013/322261&r= |
| By: | Moshe Justman (Ben Gurion University); Hadas Stiassnie (Ben Gurion University) |
| Abstract: | We estimate yearly inequality in anticipated lifetime earnings—a lower bound on “true†inequality that would apply if earnings could be transferred freely over time—using a two-stage approach that first estimates the lifetime earnings of males born between 1942-87, from PSID data to 2018; and then measures inequality in these lifetime earnings estimates among males aged 25-59 in each year between 1986 and 2012. Comparing it to conventionally measured inequality in annual earnings, we find that yearly variances of log lifetime earnings are, on average, less than half the variances of log annual earnings, and much more stable, rising by only 11 percent throughout the period, where inequality in annual earnings increased by 46 percent after 1998, indicating a corresponding increase in intertemporal mobility. This dynamic pattern varies markedly from inequality in lifetime earnings measured within ten-year cohort-groups, which first rose by 40 percent from the earliest, 1942-51 cohort-group to the 1958-67 cohort-group, then declined by 26 percent for the youngest, 1978-87 cohort-group. |
| Keywords: | Earnings inequality, lifetime earnings, earnings volatility, PSID |
| JEL: | D31 I32 |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2021-579&r= |
| By: | Heinrich, Torsten |
| Abstract: | How are economies in a modern age impacted by epidemics? In what ways is economic life disrupted? How can pandemics be modeled? What can be done to mitigate and manage the danger? Does the threat of pandemics increase or decrease in the modern world? The Covid-19 pandemic has demonstrated the importance of these questions and the potential of complex systems science to provide answers. This article offers a broad overview of the history of pandemics, of established facts, and of models of infection diffusion, mitigation strategies, and economic impact. The example of the Covid-19 pandemic is used to illustrate the theoretical aspects, but the article also includes considerations concerning other historic epidemics and the danger of more infectious and less controllable outbreaks in the future. |
| Keywords: | epidemics and economics; public health; complex systems; SIR models; Agent-based models; mean-field models; Covid-19 |
| JEL: | C63 I10 N30 |
| Date: | 2021–04–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:107578&r= |
| By: | Bhargava, Palaash; Eyméoud, Jean-Benoît; Gergaud, Olivier; Laouenan, Morgane; Plique, Guillaume; Wasmer, Etienne |
| Abstract: | We add to the literature on notable individuals (famous, prominent, distinguished) in collecting first a massive amount of data from various editions of Wikipedia and Wikidata along with deduplication techniques; and then using these partially overlapping sources to cross-verify each retrieved information. This strategy results in a cross-verified database of 2.2 million individuals, including a third who are not present in the English edition of Wikipedia. An extension to 4.7 million entries is currently not recommended given the inaccuracy of the information and discrepancies between Wikidata and other sources. A non-negligible fraction of newly-added individuals were collected from non-English editions of Wikipedia. We adopt a social science approach: data collection is driven by specific social questions on gender, economic and cul- tural development and quantitative exploration of cultural trends, that we document in this paper. A sample of 100,000 individuals is available here http://medialab.github.io/bhht-datascape, together with the most recent version of this paper. |
| Keywords: | Creative Class; economic history; Notable individuals; Urban Economics |
| JEL: | N01 N9 R00 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15852&r= |
| By: | Braggion, Fabio; Meyerinck, Felix; Schaub, Nic |
| Abstract: | Inflation risk represents one of the most important economic risks faced by investors. In this study, we analyze how investors respond to inflation. We introduce a unique dataset containing local inflation and security portfolios of more than 2,000 clients of a German bank between 1920 and 1924, covering the famous German hyperinflation. We find that investors buy less (sell more) stocks when facing higher local inflation. This effect is more pronounced for less sophisticated investors. We also document a positive relation between local inflation and forgone returns following stock sales. Our findings are consistent with investors suffering from money illusion. |
| Keywords: | behavioral biases; Individual investors; inflation; Investor Behavior; Money illusion |
| JEL: | D14 E31 G11 G41 N14 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15947&r= |
| By: | Mitchener, Kris James; Trebesch, Christoph |
| Abstract: | How will sovereign debt markets evolve in the 21st century? We survey how the literature has responded to the eurozone debt crisis, placing "lessons learned" in historical perspective. The crisis featured: (i) the return of debt problems to advanced economies; (ii) a bank-sovereign "doom-loop" and the propagation of sovereign risk to households and firms; (iii) roll-over problems and self-fulfilling crisis dynamics; (iv) severe debt distress without outright sovereign defaults; (v) large-scale "sovereign bailouts" from abroad; and (vi) creditor threats to litigate and hold out in a debt restructuring. Many of these characteristics were already present in historical debt crises and are likely to remain relevant in the future. Looking forward, our survey points to a growing role of sovereign-bank linkages, legal risks, domestic debt and default, and of official creditors, due to new lenders such as China as well as the increasing dominance of central banks in global debt markets. Questions of debt sustainability and default will remain acute in both developing and advanced economies. |
| Keywords: | Bailouts; bank-sovereign doom loops; Eurozone Debt Crisis; official creditors; self-fulfilling crisis dynamics; Sovereign debt |
| JEL: | F30 F34 G12 G15 N10 N20 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15935&r= |
| By: | Rose, Michael E.; Georg, Co-Pierre |
| Abstract: | We present and discuss a novel dataset on informal collaboration in financial economics, manually collected from more than 5,000 acknowledgement sections of published papers. We find that informal collaboration is the norm in financial economics, while generational differences in informal collaboration exist and reciprocity among collaborators prevails. Female researchers appear less often in acknowledgements than comparable male researchers. Information derived from networks of informal collaboration allows us to predict academic impact of both researchers and papers even better than information from co-author networks. Finally, we study the characteristics of the networks using various measures from network theory and characterize what determines a researcher's position in it. The data presented here may help other researchers to shed light on an under-explored topic. |
| Keywords: | intellectual collaboration,acknowledgements,social networks,financial economics |
| JEL: | A14 D83 G00 O33 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:2182&r= |