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on Business, Economic and Financial History |
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Issue of 2014‒10‒03
24 papers chosen by |
| By: | Jong, Herman de (Groningen University) |
| Abstract: | Since the spread of industrialization, which began in England in the second half of the eighteenth century, many countries took off on a development path leading to modern economic growth. The process of modernization resulted in a sixteen-fold increase in the standard of living of the average world citizen. Productivity growth and structural change, however, was characterized by uneven development, within and across nations. This paper discusses the various ways in which welfare growth is measured and how the different aspects of quality of life such as inequality, health and leisure have developed in the long run. The paper closes with a discussion of an historical index of human development across world regions since 1870. It conjectures that social indicators are becoming more dependent again on income growth, in contrast to the experience of the first half of the twentieth century. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:rugggd:gd-148&r=his |
| By: | McLaughlin, Eoin; Foley-Fisher, Nathan |
| Abstract: | This paper introduces a new database on Irish land bonds listed on the Dublin Stock Exchange from 1891 to 1938: it outlines the nature of these bonds and presents data on their size, liquidity and market returns. These government-guaranteed bonds arose during a period when the possibility of Irish secession from the United Kingdom appeared ever more likely, and were used to finance the transfer of land ownership from landlords to tenants in Ireland (North & South). Movements in the prices of these bonds can help to understand how financial markets responded to events in the early economic and political history of the Irish Free State, including Irish partition, Independence, Civil War and de facto default. Understanding these issues has contemporary relevance for regions in Spain (Catalonia, Euskadi), Great Britain (Scotland) and Belgium (Flanders). |
| Keywords: | Irish economic history, land reform, land bonds, Dublin Stock Exchange, |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:sirdps:534&r=his |
| By: | Mori, Takahito |
| Abstract: | It has been generally assumed in the study of German urban history that the municipal electric services were brought to an end by the growth of regional power networks during the Weimar period. However, municipal electric services were not completely replaced by regional power systems. So, this paper examines, on the basis of a case study of Frankfurt am Main, how the municipal electric services were able to sustain themselves as an autonomous system against the expanding influence of regional power networks based on private capital during the Weimar period. Frankfurt tried not only to enlarge its power stations but also to utilize the waterpower and brown coal obtained nearby the city, with a view to defending its autonomy against the Rheinisch-Westfälisches Elektrizitätswerk AG. These attempts enabled Frankfurt to preserve its autonomous electric services until the second half of the 20th century, though it owed a lot to the assistance from Preussenelektra, the national electric power company of Prussia. |
| Keywords: | "Electric War", "Electric Peace", Frankfurt am Main, Preußenelektra, RWE |
| Date: | 2014–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hit:econdp:2014-12&r=his |
| By: | Stavros Thomadakis, Dimitrios Gounopoulos, Christos Nounis and Michalis Riginos |
| Abstract: | The study explores the growth of the Athens Stock Exchange through new listings and IPOs over the period 1880-1940. We examine institutional changes in exchange governance and listing requirements. On a theme that has not been addressed before, we find that simple listings were far more numerous than actual IPOs, while even during ‘hot’ listing periods IPO activity was relatively limited. IPOs in Greece remained unregulated throughout the period and there is only sparse evidence on the involvement of professional investment banking services. IPOs over-pricing in the early decades gives way to under-pricing in the 1920s. The growth of the Greek stock market was coincident with development episodes in the economy, as well as phases of protectionism. It has been driven by a demand for listings basically serving the liquidity needs of company owners. Finally, the study presents data on "quasi-IPOs" (i.e. capital increases shortly after listing) and shows that they offer a more accurate assessment of the demand for the financing of listing firms. |
| Keywords: | Listings, Initial public offerings; financial history; financial innovation |
| JEL: | N23 N43 G18 |
| Date: | 2014–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hel:greese:86&r=his |
| By: | Enkelejda Havari (University of Venice "Cà Foscari"); Franco Peracchi (University of Rome "Tor Vergata" and EIEF) |
| Abstract: | We study the long-term consequences of war on health and human capital of Europeans born during the first half of the twentieth century, a period that has been termed the "era of two world wars". This period includes not only WW1 and WW2, but also the Spanish Flu and a long series of armed con icts which foreshadowed or followed the two world wars. Using a variety of data, at both the macro- and the micro-level, we address the following questions: What are the patterns of mortality and survival among people born during this era? What are the consequences of early-life shocks on the health and human capital of the survivors some 50 years later? Do these consequences differ by gender, socio-economic status in childhood, and age when the shocks occurred? We find that mortality is much higher in war- than in non-war countries during WW1 and WW2, but not during the Spanish Flu. We also find important differences between WW1 and WW2 in the mortality patterns by gender and age. As for the long-term consequences of mortality shocks on the survivors, we find little evidence of increased adult mortality for people born during WW1 and WW2, but some evidence for people born during the Spanish Flu, especially, in England and Wales, France and Italy. On the other hand, war-related hardship episodes in childhood or adolescence (in particular exposure to war events and hunger) are strong predictors of physical and mental health, education, cognitive ability and wellbeing past age 50. The magnitude of the estimated effects differs by socio-economic status in childhood and gender, with exposure to war events having a larger impact on females and exposure to hunger having a larger impact on males. We also find that exposure to hunger matters more in childhood, while exposure to war events matters more in adolescence. Finally, we find that hardship episodes have stronger consequences if they last longer. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eie:wpaper:1405&r=his |
| By: | Hart, Robert A.; Roberts, J. Elizabeth |
| Abstract: | Based on detailed payroll data of blue collar male and female labor in Britain’s engineering and metal working industrial sectors between the mid-1920s and mid-1960s, we provide empirical evidence in respect of several central themes in the piecework-timework wage literature. The period covers part of the heyday of pieceworking as well as the start of its post-war decline. We show the importance of relative piece rate flexibility during the Great Depression as well as during the build up to WWII and during the war itself. We account for the very significant decline in the differentials after the war. Labor market topics include piecework pay in respect of compensating differentials, labor heterogeneity, and the transaction costs of pricing piecework output. |
| Keywords: | Piecework – timework hourly pay differentials, output fluctuations, labor heterogeneity, output pricing, |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:sirdps:574&r=his |
| By: | Roberto Bonfatti (University of Nottingham); Kevin Hjortshøj O’Rourke (All Souls College, Oxford) |
| Abstract: | Existing theories of pre-emptive war typically predict that the leading country may choose to launch a war on a follower who is catching up, since the follower cannot credibly commit to not use their increased power in the future. But it was Japan who launched a war against the West in 1941, not the West that pre-emptively attacked Japan. Similarly, many have argued that trade makes war less likely, yet World War I erupted at a time of unprecedented globalization. This paper develops a theoretical model of the relationship between trade and war which can help to explain both these observations. Dependence on strategic imports can lead follower nations to launch pre-emptive wars when they are potentially subject to blockade. |
| Date: | 2014–09–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nuf:esohwp:_132&r=his |
| By: | Claudio Borio; Harold James; Hyun Song Shin |
| Abstract: | In analysing the performance of the international monetary and financial system (IMFS), too much attention has been paid to the current account and far too little to the capital account. This is true of both formal analytical models and historical narratives. This approach may be reasonable when financial markets are highly segmented. But it is badly inadequate when they are closely integrated, as they have been most of the time since at least the second half of the 19th century. Zeroing on the capital account shifts the focus from the goods markets to asset markets and balance sheets. Seen through this lens, the IMFS looks quite different. Its main weakness is its propensity to amplify financial surges and collapses that generate costly financial crises – its "excess financial elasticity". And assessing the vulnerabilities it hides requires going beyond the residence/non-resident distinction that underpins the balance of payments to look at the consolidated balance sheets of the decision units that straddle national borders, be these banks or non-financial companies. We illustrate these points by revisiting two defining historical phases in which financial meltdowns figured prominently, the interwar years and the more recent Great Financial Crisis. |
| Keywords: | excess financial elasticity, banking glut, current account, capital account, financial cycle, financial crises |
| Date: | 2014–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bis:biswps:457&r=his |
| By: | Phoebe Koundouri; Nikolaos Kourogenis (Department of Banking and Financial Management, University of Piraeus.); Nikitas Pittis (University of Piraeus, Greece) |
| Abstract: | The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to survey the statistical models of stock returns that have been suggested in the finance literature since the middle of the twentieth century; second, to examine under the prism of the contemporary philosophy of science, which of the aforementioned models can be classified as explanatory and which as descriptive. Special emphasis is paid on tracing the interactions between the motivation for the birth of statistical models of stock returns in any given historical period and the concurrent changes of the theoretical paradigm in financial economics, as well as those of probability theory. |
| Keywords: | Stock Returns, Statistical Model, Explanatory Model, Scientific Explanation, Market Efficiency, Brownian Motion. |
| JEL: | C58 C51 G17 |
| Date: | 2014–09–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aue:wpaper:1410&r=his |
| By: | Alexei Gloukhov (National Research University Higher School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | The rebirth of communism, as shown by a new wave of publications (A. Badiou, B. Groys, S. Zizek), disqualifies the historical peculiarity of the Soviet experience in favor of the eternal “idea of communism”, originating in the works of the Ancient Greek philosopher, Plato. It is an ironic reversal of the fates suffered by the studies of Antiquity after the Russian Revolution. Apparently, the present day supra-historical idealism and the old school historical materialism exclude each other. On the other hand, an analysis of Soviet cultural politics from the 1920-30s may demonstrate that those radical theoretical stances were presented as distinct practical phases in the same changing experience of communism. A repudiation of the Soviet past brings for the current rebirth of communism nothing other than the hiding of ugly practical problems behind theoretical purity. |
| Keywords: | communism, cultural politics, Russian revolution, Soviet experience, Antiquity, Plato |
| JEL: | Z |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hig:wpaper:60hum2014&r=his |
| By: | Enrico Spolaore; Romain Wacziarg |
| Abstract: | We investigate the historical dynamics of the decline in fertility in Europe and its relation to measures of cultural and ancestral distance. We test the hypothesis that the decline of fertility was associated with the diffusion of social and behavioral changes from France, in contrast with the spread of the Industrial Revolution, where England played a leading role. We argue that the diffusion of the fertility decline and the spread of industrialization followed different patterns because societies at different relative distances from the respective innovators (the French and the English) faced different barriers to imitation and adoption, and such barriers were lower for societies that were historically and culturally closer to the innovators. We provide a model of fertility choices in which the transition from higher to lower levels of fertility is the outcome of a process of social innovation and social influence, whereby late adopters observe and learn about the novel behaviors, norms and practices introduced by early adopters at the frontier. In the empirical analysis we study the determinants of marital fertility in a sample of European populations and regions from 1830 t0 1970, and successfully test our theoretical predictions using measures of genetic distance between European populations and a novel data set of ancestral linguistic distances between European regions. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tuf:tuftec:0779&r=his |
| By: | Leandro Prados de la Escosura |
| Abstract: | Comparisons of economic performance over space and time largely depend on how statistical evidence from national accounts and historical estimates are spliced. To allow for changes in relative prices, GDP benchmark years in national accounts are periodically replaced with new and more recent ones. Thus, a homogeneous long-run GDP series requires linking different temporal segments of national accounts. The choice of the splicing procedure may result in substantial differences in GDP levels and growth, particularly as an economy undergoes deep structural transformation. An inadequate splicing may result in a serious bias in the measurement of GDP levels and growth rates. Alternative splicing solutions are discussed in this paper for the particular case of Spain, a fast growing country in the second half of the twentieth century. It is concluded that the usual linking procedure, retropolation, has serious flows as it tends to bias GDP levels upwards and, consequently, to underestimate growth rates, especially for developing countries experiencing structural change. An alternative interpolation procedure is proposed. |
| Keywords: | Growth measurement, Splicing GDP, Historical national accounts, Spain |
| JEL: | C82 E01 N13 O47 |
| Date: | 2014–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:whrepe:wp14-04&r=his |
| By: | Sng, Tuan-Hwee; Moriguchi, Chiaki |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the role of state capacity in the comparative economic development of China and Japan. Before 1850, both nations were ruled by stable dictators who relied on bureaucrats to govern their domains. We hypothesize that agency problems increase with the geographical size of a domain. In a large domain, the ruler's inability to closely monitor bureaucrats creates opportunities for the bureaucrats to exploit taxpayers. To prevent overexploitation, the ruler has to keep taxes low and government small. Our dynamic model shows that while economic expansion improves the ruler's finances in a small domain, it could lead to lower tax revenues in a large domain as it exacerbates bureaucratic expropriation. To test these implications, we assemble comparable quantitative data from primary and secondary sources. We find that the state taxed less and provided fewer local public goods per capita in China than in Japan. Furthermore, while the Tokugawa shogunate's tax revenue grew in tandem with demographic trends, Qing China underwent fiscal contraction after 1750 despite demographic expansion. We conjecture that a greater state capacity might have prepared Japan better for the transition from stagnation to growth. |
| Keywords: | Comparative Institutional Analysis, Geography, Principal-Agent Problem, Institutions and Growth |
| JEL: | D73 N15 N40 O43 P52 |
| Date: | 2014–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hit:hitcei:2014-6&r=his |
| By: | Frederic Teulon |
| Abstract: | Karl Popper est un intellectuel d’origine autrichienne, il a été un des plus grands philosophe des sciences du XXe siècle. Défenseur de la société libérale, il est surtout connu pour avoir développé une théorie de la “falsification” dans le but de montrer de quelle façon la science peut s'approcher de la vérité. Il est connu également pour sa critique du déterminisme et de l'historicisme et pour son plaidoyer en faveur de l'individualisme méthodologique. |
| Keywords: | Epistémologie évolutionniste, Historicisme, Karl Popper, Libéralisme, Mont Pèlerin (société du), Rationalité, Science et falsification. |
| Date: | 2014–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ipg:wpaper:2014-575&r=his |
| By: | Chu, Tianshu; Jong, Herman de; Ma, Ye (Groningen University) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates China?s economic development between 1840 and 1912. We look at living standards and general economic trends in the late Qing dynasty and discuss the reliability of existing estimations of per capita GDP. Secondly, we introduce a new estimate of long-term growth. Our estimation provides for the first time a continuous time series of both nominal and real GDP per capita for the period 1840-1912. We see this as a starting point for further research on 19th century developments in levels of economic welfare and the performance of the Chinese economy. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:rugggd:gd-147&r=his |
| By: | Oxley, Les; Hanley, Nick; Greasley, David; Blum, Matthias; McLaughlin, Eoin; Kunnas, Jan; Warde, Paul |
| Abstract: | Genuine Savings has emerged as a widely-used indicator of sustainable development. In this paper, we use long-term data stretching back to 1870 to undertake empirical tests of the relationship between Genuine Savings (GS) and future well-being for three countries: Britain, the USA and Germany. Our tests are based on an underlying theoretical relationship between GS and changes in the present value of future consumption. Based on both single country and panel results, we find evidence supporting the existence of a cointegrating (long run equilibrium) relationship between GS and future well-being, and fail to reject the basic theoretical result on the relationship between these two macroeconomic variables. This provides some support for the GS measure of weak sustainability. We also show the effects of modelling shocks, such as World War Two and the Great Depression. |
| Keywords: | Weak sustainability, Genuine Savings, comprehensive investment, economic history, indicators, cointegration, |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:sirdps:551&r=his |
| By: | Jakob B. MADSEN (Department of Economics, Monash University.); James B. ANG (Division of Economics, Nanyang Technological University) |
| Abstract: | It is well established in the literature that financial development (FD) is conducive to growth, and yet the channels through which FD affects growth are not well understood. Using a unique new panel data set for 21 OECD countries over the past 140 years, this paper examines the extent to which FD transmits to growth through ideas production, savings, fixed investment, and schooling. Unionization and agricultural share are used as instruments for FD. The empirical results show that FD influences growth through all four channels. In particular, ideas production is found to be the most important channel through which FD impacts on growth. |
| Keywords: | ideas production; savings; investment; schooling; growth; financial development. |
| JEL: | O16 O30 O40 O53 |
| Date: | 2014–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nan:wpaper:1408&r=his |
| By: | Mason Gaffney (Department of Economics, University of California Riverside) |
| Abstract: | World lenders have dismissed warnings from credit rating firms and kept buying and holding U.S. Treasuries for security. The likely reason is that our tax system is stronger than Europe's. The major difference is that Europe has come to rely heavily on VATs, while the U.S. stands alone in not having any. VAT's broad tax base is not succeeding in maintaining revenues, even as tax rates climb. J.S. Mill faulted general sales taxes like VAT for taxing capital itself, not just its income, for turning over; Frank Ramsey and A.C. Pigou for ignoring different elasticities of supply and demand. Gaffney refutes the idea that such taxes foster capital formation. VAT arose in 1954 France, and metastasized quickly worldwide. It reversed two centuries of progress in tax systems and turned Europe back towards the practices of l'ancien régime before 1800. The next step is on how the U.S.A. came to adopt and develop tax systems more congenial to commerce and industry and high wages than did Europe. Credit is due to Turgot, and allied French économistes who bent the minds of our Founding Fathers. Credit is later due to leaders of The Progressive Movement who framed our early income-tax laws. Step 3 explains how Germany's Currency Reform under Erhard quickly raised Germany back from the dead, and it how it demonstrated a fundamental principle of how taxes affect incentives positively, the wealth effect. Then, the original French VAT grew as the unseen protegé of European unity, while the U.S.A. fostered VAT everywhere around the world except at home. Step 4 illustrates how Europe stagnated as VAT grew, and how banks and public exchequers grew mutually dependent, together building a house of cards based on future tax revenues – revenues that VAT cannot provide, even as it chokes off productive commerce and industry and employment. Step 5 explains the theory of the excess burdens of VAT taxation, and faults economists, both conventional and Austrian, for failing to expound and highlight these, and relate them to Europe's unstanchable flood of troubles. Step 6 traces the role of a host of economic scholars and statesmen in rationalizing, endorsing and promoting VAT, from Thomas Hobbes to the Republican Platform of 2012. Step 7 discusses the role of the cartel of international agencies and banks in promoting "harmony", in taxing, lending and collecting. It gives evidence that Europe has NOT reached the limit of its taxable capacity; rather, it needs a better tax system and philosophy, with higher rates on narrower and less elastic bases. |
| Date: | 2013–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucr:wpaper:201301&r=his |
| By: | Michael Greenacre |
| Abstract: | The book "Mathematics and Archaeology", consisting of 25 chapters by a range of international scholars in archaeology, will be published by Chapman & Hall in 2014. The present document, written as an invited Epilogue to the book, recounts the rediscovery of the book 275 years later by an archaeolinguist. The remnants of the book have been found in the Universitat Pompeu Fabra’s dilapidated library, which fell into disuse after books were abandoned in favour of electronic publishing. The archaeolinguist explains how statistical methods found in old texts on quantitative archaeology helped to piece together the basic content of this book, using the words in the chapters as artefacts. |
| Keywords: | archaeology, clustering, correspondence analysis, linguistics, multivariate analysis, textual data mining. |
| JEL: | C19 C88 |
| Date: | 2014–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upf:upfgen:1433&r=his |
| By: | Francois Bonnet (PACTE - Politiques publiques, ACtion politique, TErritoires - Institut d'Études Politiques [IEP] - Grenoble - CNRS : UMR5194 - Université Pierre-Mendès-France - Grenoble II - Université Joseph Fourier - Grenoble I); Clément Théry (Columbia University - Columbia University) |
| Abstract: | What are the implications of Piketty's Capital for sociology and political science? Capital's argument focuses on the evolution of the r/g ratio (capital returns over growth rate) and outlines two modes of economic inequalities. One is characteristic of affluent (g > r) societies and the other is characteristic of patrimonial (r > g) societies. With the current return to a patrimonial society, corporations become political actors; occupational status and education's relevance are declining; the meaning of poverty is transformed, and welfare and punishment become interdependent means to social order; in politics, elitist theories gain traction; immigration is less about assimilation, and more about transnationalism and nationalist politics. We show that some theories are more relevant in an affluent society, and others are more adequate to a patrimonial society. |
| Keywords: | inequality; capitalism; corporate governance; education; social structure; power |
| Date: | 2014–08–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:halshs-01060570&r=his |
| By: | Christian Cordes (University of Bremen) |
| Abstract: | This article reviews the most important transfers of this kind into evolutionary economics. It broadly differentiates between approaches that draw on an analogy construction to the biological sphere, those that make metaphorical use of Darwinian ideas, and avenues that are based on the fact that other forms of – cultural – evolution rest upon foundations laid before by natural selection. It is shown that an evolutionary approach within economics informed by insights from cognitive science, evolutionary biology, and anthropology contributes to more realistic models of human behavior in economic contexts. |
| Keywords: | evolutionary economics, human behavior, biological evolution, cultural evolution, generalized Darwinism, continuity hypothesis, Neo-Schumpeterians, American Institutionalism, competition |
| JEL: | B15 B25 B52 D03 Z1 |
| Date: | 2014–09–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:esi:evopap:2014-02&r=his |
| By: | Blum, Matthias; McLaughlin, Eoin; Hanley, Nick |
| Abstract: | Genuine Savings (GS), also known as ‘net adjusted savings’, is a composite indicator of the sustainability of economic development. Genuine Savings reflects year-on-year changes in the total wealth or capital of a country, including net investment in produced capita, investment in human capital, depletion of natural resources, and damage caused by pollution. A negative Genuine Savings rate suggests that the stock of national wealth is declining and that future utility must be less than current utility, indicating that economic development is non-sustainable (Hamilton and Clemens, 1999). We make use of data over a 150 year period to examine the relationship between Genuine Savings and a number of indicators of well-being over time, and compare the relative changes in human, produced, and components of natural capital over the period. Overall, we find that the magnitude of genuine savings is positively related to changes in future consumption, with some evidence of a cointegrating relationship. However, the relationships between genuine savings and infant mortality or average heights are less clear. |
| Keywords: | Sustainability, economic development, Net adjusted savings, Genuine Savings, well-being, |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:edn:sirdps:573&r=his |
| By: | Mónica Pachón; Fabio Sánchez |
| Abstract: | Este documento presenta la estructura de la primera base de datos que compila todos los resultados electorales del país desde 1958 hasta 2011. Contiene información detallada sobre las elecciones de alcaldes, gobernadores, concejales, asambleístas, cámara y senado, y presidencia. Adicionalmente, este documento presenta un listado de observaciones e instrucciones que se deben tener en cuenta para el manejo de la información. |
| Keywords: | Elecciones, Base de datos, Colombia |
| JEL: | Y1 P16 P48 |
| Date: | 2014–08–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000089:012058&r=his |
| By: | Christopher Shultz (Regional Research Institute, West Virginia University); Randall W. Jackson (Regional Research Institute, West Virginia University) |
| Keywords: | water resources, ecological economics, environment and development |
| JEL: | Q32 Q56 Q57 |
| Date: | 2014–08–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rri:wpaper:2014rd01&r=his |