nep-gro New Economics Papers
on Economic Growth
Issue of 2026–04–13
two papers chosen by
Marc Klemp, University of Copenhagen


  1. Flora, Cosmos, Salvatio: Pre-modern Academic Institutions and the Spread of Ideas By David de la Croix; Rossana Scebba; Chiara Zanardello
  2. Macroeconomic Consequences of Sustained Warming: A Bias-Corrected Dynamic Heterogeneous Panel Approach By Samuele Centorrino; Emanuele Massetti; Kamiar Mohaddes; Mehdi Raissi; Jui-Chung Yang

  1. By: David de la Croix (UNIVERSITE CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES)); Rossana Scebba (UNIVERSITE CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES)); Chiara Zanardello (Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse (IAST). Toulouse School of Economics, Universite Toulouse Capitole)
    Abstract: While good ideas can emerge anywhere, it takes a community to develop and disseminate them. In premodern Europe (1084-1793), there were approximately 200 universities and 150 academies of sciences, home to thousands of scholars from the Middle Ages to the First Industrial Revolution. By inferring co-presence from institutional affiliations, we simulate how ideas would spread from a scholar to another across the European academic network. We find that the implied exposure patterns align with observed urban developments: examples include botanic gardens, astronomical observatories, and Protestantism. Scholars’ mobility and multiple affiliations sustain the diffusion, and counterfactual simulations underscore the bridging role played by scientific academies. We also show that the spread of ideas through the affiliation network was locally fragile but globally robust, pointing towards academia as being a connective infrastructure underlying early European development.
    Keywords: Temporal Network, Structural Estimation, Scientific Revolution, European Academia, Epidemiological model
    JEL: N33 O33 I23
    Date: 2026–03–30
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ctl:louvir:2026008
  2. By: Samuele Centorrino; Emanuele Massetti; Kamiar Mohaddes; Mehdi Raissi; Jui-Chung Yang
    Abstract: This paper studies how increasing temperatures have affected the economies of 195 countries between 1960 and 2022, focusing on income losses caused by gradual shifts to new climate conditions. We contribute to the expanding literature on climate-macroeconomic linkages by developing a dynamic heterogeneous panel model that distinguishes between the long-term and short-term effects, accounts for adaptation through rolling climate norms, and addresses key econometric challenges including non-stationarity, cross-country heterogeneity, and unobserved global factors. Our findings reveal that a sustained 0.01°C annual increase in temperatures above historical climate norms reduces global GDP per capita growth by 0.05 percentage points per year, with income losses accumulating as long as temperatures keep increasing. This effect is 70% larger than what would be estimated under a homogeneous panel specification. Contrary to much of the existing literature, no country appears immune to the impacts of rising temperatures: middle- and high-income nations, as well as those in temperate or cold, and hot climate zones, all exhibit persistent (though not permanent) growth slowdowns, with income losses linked to how quickly they adapt.
    Keywords: climate change, growth, adaptation, dynamic heterogeneous panels, cross-section dependence
    JEL: C23 O40 O44 Q54
    Date: 2026–04
    URL: https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:een:camaaa:2026-23

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