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on Business, Economic and Financial History |
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Issue of 2015‒02‒28
27 papers chosen by |
| By: | Peter Cirenza |
| Abstract: | This paper uses empirical evidence drawn from newly constructed datasets to assess the impact of geographic clustering on the assimilation and occupational mobility of Irish immigrants in the United States in the late nineteenth century. It finds that geographic clustering was quite pronounced for Irish immigrants in this time period. Irish immigrants were primarily drawn to the large metropolitan areas of the Northeast, reflecting the importance of these areas as points of entry to the US, areas of prior settlement by previous generations of Irish immigrants, as well as major centres for employment for new immigrants. This paper also finds that higher levels of geographic clustering were associated with both lower degrees of assimilation and lower occupational outcomes. The benefits of geographic clustering in the job market often described in this literature do not appear to have existed for Irish immigrants in the late nineteenth century. These results would also support the view that living in a more ethnically concentrated community, though perhaps improving the initial starting position of Irish immigrants in America, may have come at the expense of slower subsequent assimilation and reduced occupational mobility. |
| Keywords: | international migration; geographic mobility; immigrant; immigrant labour; immigration; economic history |
| JEL: | N0 R14 J01 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:60964&r=his |
| By: | Felice, Emanuele |
| Abstract: | Abstract (English) In recent years there have been major advances in our historical knowledge of regional disparities in Italy; as a consequence, the debate on the causes of the North-South divide (and thus, ultimately, on strategies and possibilities to overcome it) has also revived. By mainly drawing on my latest book on this subject [Perché il Sud è rimasto indietro, 2013], this paper presents the state of the art of the history of Italy’s North-South divide, since Unification until our days. The first section provides an updated discussion of regional differences − in income but also in social indicators − at the time of the country’s Unification (1861). In the second section, the evolution of regional GDPs from the late XIX century until our days is briefly reviewed, through the main phases of Italian political and economic history. The third part provides a critical discussion, with some reference to the international literature, on the various hypotheses put forward to explain the persistent North-South divide. My main argument is summed up in the conclusions: there was a socio-institutional divide between the North and the South of the peninsula, that pre-exists Unification, in some respects grows stronger with it and is never bridged throughout the history of post-unification Italy. Admittedly, some socio-institutional convergence took place in the last decades, but this went in a direction opposite to the desirable one − that is, the North and Italy as a whole have begun to look similar to the South, rather than viceversa. Abstract (italiano) Negli ultimi anni sono stati fatti importanti progressi nella nostra conoscenza sull’evoluzione dei divari regionali in Italia; ultimamente si è anche riaperto il dibattito sulle cause del divario Nord-Sud (e quindi, in prospettiva, sulle strategie e le possibilità per superarlo). A partire dall’analisi più distesa condotta in Perché il Sud è rimasto indietro [Felice 2013], questo intervento prova a fare il punto sullo stato dell’arte. La prima parte è dedicata alla discussione delle differenze regionali − nel reddito ma anche negli indicatori sociali − intorno all’Unità. Nella seconda, verrà illustrato brevemente l’andamento dei divari di reddito dall’Unità sino ai nostri giorni, lungo le principali fasi della storia unitaria. La terza parte offre una discussione critica, con qualche riferimento alla letteratura internazionale, sulle spiegazioni ipotizzate circa il persistente divario Nord-Sud che non ritengo essere adeguate per il caso italiano. Nelle conclusioni si riassume invece brevemente la tesi sostenuta in Perché il Sud è rimasto indietro: ovvero l’esistenza di un divario di tipo socio-istituzionale fra il Nord e il Sud della penisola, che preesiste all’Unificazione, si rafforza con essa e non viene mai superato nel corso della nostra storia − se non forse negli ultimi anni, ma in una direzione contraria a quella auspicabile, con il Nord che rischia di assomigliare sempre più al Mezzogiorno. |
| Keywords: | Storia economica d’Italia; Sviluppo regionale; Questione meridionale; Stime del Pil; Istituzioni. |
| JEL: | N13 N14 N93 N94 R11 |
| Date: | 2015–02–16 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:62209&r=his |
| By: | Christian Dippel ; Avner Greif ; Daniel Trefler |
| Abstract: | The 19th century collapse of world sugar prices should have depressed wages in the British West Indies sugar colonies. It did not. We explain this by showing how lower prices weakened the power of the white planter elite and thus led to an easing of the coercive institutions that depressed wages e.g., institutions that kept land out of the hands of peasants. Using unique data for 14 British West Indies sugar colonies from 1838 to 1913, we examine the impact of the collapse of sugar prices on wages and incarceration rates. We find that in colonies that were poorly suited for sugar cane cultivation (an exogenous colony characteristic), the planter elite declined in power and the institutions they created and supported became less coercive. As a result, wages rose by 20% and incarceration rates per capita were cut in half. In contrast, in colonies that were highly suited for sugar cane there was little change in the power of the planter elite --- as a result, institutions did not change, the market-based mechanisms of standard trade theory were salient, and wages fell by 24%. In short, movements in the terms of trade induced changes in coercive institutions, changes that are central for understanding how the terms of trade affects wages. |
| JEL: | F1 F16 N26 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:20958&r=his |
| By: | Jaremski, Matthew (Department of Economics, Colgate University ); Plastaras, Brady (Department of Economics, Colgate University ) |
| Abstract: | Scholars have studied the U.S. banking systems of the late 19th century, but the presence and influence of mutual savings banks has largely gone unexamined. A new annual database of New England banks shows that mutual savings banks had a significant presence in the postbellum banking system. Mutual savings banks accounted for about 75 percent of the region's total bank deposits and largely avoided financial panics. The banks seemed to have complemented rather than competed with national banks. Mutual savings bank growth was correlated with agriculture and urbanization, whereas national bank growth was correlated with manufacturing. Mutual savings banks also channeled significant funds to national banks through the interbank network. |
| Keywords: | Mutual Savings Banks, Bank Stability, National Banking Era, Bank Competition |
| JEL: | N21 G21 G32 |
| Date: | 2015–04–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cgt:wpaper:2015-02&r=his |
| By: | James Fenske |
| Abstract: | We show that rainfall, temperature, and commodity price shocks predict unrest in colonial French West Africa between 1906 and 1956. We use a simple model of taxation and anti-tax resistance to explain these results. In the colonial period, the response of unrest to economic shocks was strongest in more remote areas and those lacking a history of pre-colonial states. In modern data spanning 1997 to 2011, the effect of economic shocks on unrest is weaker. Past patterns of heterogeneity are no longer present. The response of unrest to economic shocks, then, differs across institutional contexts within a single location. |
| Date: | 2015–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oxf:wpaper:wps/2015-01&r=his |
| By: | Blake Edward Taylor |
| Abstract: | This study analyses thousands of corporate annual reports and financial data from 1960-2000 to propose an early history of the term ‘shareholder value’ in the United States. Scholarly interest in ‘shareholder value’ has burgeoned since 2000, but still little is known about the term’s origins. My findings suggest that corporate managers’ intentional and repeated use of the term did not begin until the early 1980s and was not widespread until the 1990s. Further, my analysis of General Electric Corporation, Johnson & Johnson, and The Coca-Cola Company suggests that adopting ‘shareholder value’ rhetoric likely had little impact on the performance of these case study firms. |
| Keywords: | corporate governance; shareholder; corporations; firm behaviour; corporate payout; corporate control; firm objectives; management |
| JEL: | F3 G3 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:wpaper:60967&r=his |
| By: | SHIPP, Stephanie S. |
| Keywords: | Social and Behavioral Sciences, science and technology, policy history, decision hierarchy, united states |
| Date: | 2013–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:globco:qt84b0997x&r=his |
| By: | Daniela Parisi (Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore ) |
| Abstract: | The sciences tell us that fears are physical feelings and mental emotions that play a key role in any society. Not many issues related to fear are explored by economists today. The aim of this paper is to go backwards through the history of economic thought, and examine if and how Adam Smith considered fear in his work: in effect, he devoted a great deal of attention to the concept of fear. This paper does not intend to cover the whole of the topic at hand as it would also be useful to investigate the connections between fear and all the other feelings that pervade Smith's thought. |
| Keywords: | Adam Smith, Human Passions, Fear, Sociology, Psychology, Neurosciences |
| JEL: | B12 |
| Date: | 2014–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ctc:serie1:def008&r=his |
| By: | BONVILLIAN, William B. |
| Keywords: | Social and Behavioral Sciences, Innovation history, policy history, science and technology, united states |
| Date: | 2013–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:globco:qt5ct6k4wj&r=his |
| By: | Tyabji, Nasir |
| Abstract: | The paper argues that the Indian Managing Agencies that controlled most industrial firms and their associated enterprises were themselves embodiments of pre-industrial forms of capital, accumulated through trading and moneylending. This militated against technological dynamism within the industrial firms because the managing agencies applied a profit maximising calculus across their various business activities, rather than in relationship to any individual firm. The group structure, in fact, facilitated the leakage of surpluses generated in industrial activity into the parallel speculative and money lending interests of the Managing Agents. After independence, the Government’s attempts to reform the industrial sector met resistance from politically influential businessmen who had supported the national anti-colonial movement. The British Government also interceded here. The social engineering that these reforms entailed, embodied in legislation, was thwarted by the combined pressures exerted by affected businessmen, but this should not prevent an appreciation of what the state was attempting. |
| Keywords: | Managing Agencies, Merchant Capital, Usury Capital, Indian entrepreneurship |
| JEL: | D22 G38 K23 K42 M14 N25 P12 P16 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:62260&r=his |
| By: | Cedrini, Mario ; Fontana, Magda (University of Turin ) |
| Abstract: | There is considerable discussion on the so-called “mainstream pluralism”, which stems from the growth and coexistence of new research programs in economics that significantly deviate from the neoclassical core. Other disciplines have actively contributed to the birth of such programs, that are carried on by different, often separated communities of researchers. Although “mainstream pluralism” is not the pluralism heterodox economists and students groups have sought for in the recent decades, its persistence over time might provide a possible precondition for the advent of pluralism in economics. While the literature tends to regard mainstream pluralism as a transitory state towards a new, post-neoclassical, mainstream, this paper contributes to the debate by bringing in a different perspective, focusing on economics’ fragmentation and the necessity of specialization. We adopt a “late Kuhnian” framework (derived from Kuhn’s late works on specialization), considering not scientific revolutions but specialization as key engine of progress in science, and interpret mainstream pluralism as the result of economics’ recent growth in size and dive rsity. To account for the necessity of specialization in economics, we employ Ronald Heiner’s work on the competence-difficulty gap, as well as the evidence offered in some recent studies about the impact of the “burden” of previously accumulated knowledge on innovative behaviour. After a bird’s eye view on the recent history of economics in relation to other disciplines (and an analysis of Herbert Gintis’s “unity of behavioral sciences” proposal as possible new mains tream), we discuss the possibility that today’s “mainstream pluralism” might persist over time. |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uto:dipeco:201510&r=his |
| By: | B. Zorina Khan |
| Abstract: | What is the effect of wars on industrialization, technology and commercial activity? In economic terms, such events as wars comprise a large exogenous shock to labor and capital markets, aggregate demand, the distribution of expenditures, and the rate and direction of technological innovation. In addition, if private individuals are extremely responsive to changes in incentives, wars can effect substantial changes in the allocation of resources, even within a decentralized structure with little federal control and a low rate of labor participation in the military. This paper examines war-time resource reallocation in terms of occupation, geographical mobility, and the commercialization of inventions during the American Civil War. The empirical evidence shows the war resulted in a significant temporary misallocation of resources, by reducing geographical mobility, and by creating incentives for individuals with high opportunity cost to switch into the market for military technologies, while decreasing financial returns to inventors. However, the end of armed conflict led to a rapid period of catching up, suggesting that the war did not lead to a permanent misallocation of inputs, and did not long inhibit the capacity for future technological progress. |
| JEL: | N11 N4 O3 O51 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:20944&r=his |
| By: | John O'Hagan (Department of Economics, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland ); Karol Jan BOROWIECKI (Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark ; Department of Economics, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland ) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the 522 most important composers in the last 800 years, as identified by Murray (2003), in terms of their birth location and migration. It also looks at detailed patterns of migration and tendencies to cluster in certain cities for those composers born from 1750 to 1899. This information is compiled from the large on-line Grove encyclopaedia of Music. There is also some discussion of the biases evident in choosing ‘significant’ composers. The data show a marked level of migration of important composers going back many centuries suggesting that phenomenon of globalisation had impacted on composers many centuries before its effects were more widespread. The data also show a marked level of clustering in certain cities. |
| Keywords: | composers, geographic concentration, labour mobility, migration |
| Date: | 2009–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tcd:tcduee:tep0115&r=his |
| By: | Bjerkholt, Olav (Dept. of Economics, University of Oslo ) |
| Abstract: | The Econometric Society was founded at an "organization meeting" in December 1930. The invitations had been issued by Irving Fisher, Ragnar Frisch and, Charles F. Roos. In June the same year they had sent a form letter to a list of 31 scholars to solicit advice about establishing an international association "to help in gradually converting economics into a genuine and recognized science." The responses of these scholars from ten different countries are set out at some length in the paper. Rather than persevering in building a constituency of adherents on which a society could be funded the three initiators decided to rush ahead and sent out invitations to an organization meeting to found the Econometric Society at short notice. The paper discusses the reasons for the change of pace, indicating that Schumpeter had a decisive role, and gives an account of the deliberations of the organization meeting founding the Econometric Society. |
| Keywords: | Econometric-Society |
| JEL: | B23 B25 |
| Date: | 2014–12–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:osloec:2014_026&r=his |
| By: | Stuermer, Martin (Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas ) |
| Abstract: | My paper provides long-run evidence on the dynamic effects of supply and demand shocks on mineral commodity prices. I assemble and analyze a new data set of price and production levels of copper, lead, tin, and zinc from 1840 to 2010. Price fluctuations are primarily driven by demand rather than supply shocks. Demand shocks affect the price persistently for up to five-teen years, whereas the effect of mineral supply shocks persists for a maximum of five years. My paper shows that price surges caused by rapid industrialization are a recurrent phenomenon throughout history. Mineral commodity prices return to their declining or stable trends in the long run. |
| Keywords: | Mineral commodity markets; prices; non-renewable resources; SVAR |
| JEL: | E30 N50 Q31 Q33 |
| Date: | 2014–12–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:feddwp:1414&r=his |
| By: | G. Bampinas (Department of Economics, University of Macedonia, Greece ); T. Panagiotidis (Department of Economics, University of Macedonia, Greece; The Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis, Italy ) |
| Abstract: | This study examines the long-run hedging ability of gold and silver prices against alternative measures of consumer price index for the UK and the US. We employ a dataset that spans from 1791 to 2010, and both a time-invariant and a time-varying cointegration framework. We find that gold can at least fully hedge headline, expected and core CPI in the long-run. This ability tends to be stronger when we allow for the long term dynamics to vary over time. The inflation hedging ability of gold is on average higher in the US compared to the UK. Silver does not hedge US consumer prices albeit evidence emerges in favor of a time-varying long-run relationship in the UK. |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rim:rimwps:15-02&r=his |
| By: | Carlos Esteban Posada |
| Abstract: | Resumen: The theme of this essay is one of the most important addressed by economists, at least since Adam Smith, and one that will always attract attention. And in our case, that of economists who have witnessed a country and a time whose rates of increase in GDP per capita have gone in about two or three decades, from relatively normal to others rather low average levels, the attraction of this issue has become especially intense. Overcame so intense that, in my case, to the consciousness of the immense difficulties they would face if addressed, and knowing that the chance of saying something really new was nil, or almost. |
| JEL: | O11 O43 O41 |
| Date: | 2014–11–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:col:000122:012543&r=his |
| By: | Stephan E. Maurer |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses whether the German National Socialists used economic policies to reward their voters after their rise to power in 1933. Using data on public employment in the armed forces, public administrations and related professions from the German occupational censuses in 1925, 1933 and 1939 and addressing the potential endogeneity of the National Socialist vote share in 1933 by way of an instrumental variables strategy based on a similar party in Imperial Germany 1912, I find that cities with higher National Socialist vote shares experienced a relative increase in public employment: for every additional percentage point in the vote share, the number of public employment jobs increased by around 3.5 percent. When measured relative to the total population, a one standard-deviation increase in the 1933 vote share led to an increase in the share of public employment of a quarter of a standard deviation. |
| Keywords: | political connections; public employment; political economy; Nazi regime |
| JEL: | D72 D73 N44 N94 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:61021&r=his |
| By: | Tao Hong |
| Abstract: | When turning on the switch, people expect the light would be on. However, the business to keep the lights on is not that straightforward. This paper offers a practical overview of energy forecasting, an important task that electric utilities have been doing every day for over a century. |
| Keywords: | Energy forecasting; Electricity price forecasting; Load forecasting; Smart grid |
| JEL: | Q41 Q47 |
| Date: | 2013–12–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wuu:wpaper:hsc1315&r=his |
| By: | Carroll, G.R. ; Feng, M. ; Kuilman, J.G. (Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management ) |
| Abstract: | Although the 1997 handover of Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to China was a major political transformation, its impact on new business formation has not been fully scrutinized. Theory suggests contradictory forces may operate before, during, and after such a transformation: either a decline due to uncertainty or an increase due to opportunities created. To determine which force dominated, we first decomposed the analysis by the size of major<br/>affected social groups, then analyzed the expected impact. This led us to predict an aggregate depression of business formation, although this effect likely showed great variation and attenuated over time. Our empirical assessment relied<br/>on detailed monthly records of business registrations from 1975 to 2013, using GARCH time series modeling to analyze total registrations as well as the proportions for local and non-local businesses. Controlling for macro socioeconomic conditions, we find the registration rate dropped significantly throughout the post-handover era, implying a dominance of uncertainty. Further, new registrations displayed higher volatility following the 1984 announcement of the handover, reflecting shifting public sentiment in the interim about Hong Kong’s economic prospects. We also find a post-handover<br/>preference for forming non-local firms with higher asset mobility; this preference diminishes with time. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiutis:d1c609d6-3d48-4c49-a0dc-51bddece2562&r=his |
| By: | Gabriella Berloffa (University of Trento ); Francesca Modena (Bank of Italy ); Paola Villa (University of Trento ) |
| Abstract: | This paper considers the increased incidence of insecure job conditions for young individuals entering the Italian labour market and their chances of moving to a more secure job after a reasonable period of time. In particular, we investigate empirically whether and how long-term changes in labour market institutions and conditions have altered the role of the family of origin in both labour market entry and subsequent transitions. We use the Italian Households Longitudinal Study (Ilfi) and show that employment opportunities have changed significantly in Italy over the past three decades (from the late 1970s to the early 2000s). For an increasing share of young adults precariousness extends over a fairly long period of their working life. The family of origin reduced the probability of insecurity both in the early 1980s and during the 1990s, but in a different way: in the early 1980s, it had an effect in the entry year, but not subsequently; after the implementation of the Treu reform, its effect appeared only in the years following that of entry. Our overall results suggest that the rapid expansion of insecure contractual arrangements in the 1990s-early 2000s has increased the difficulty of transitioning to a “better” job condition (i.e. secure employment). This has enhanced the role of the family of origin in overcoming the difficulty and generated new inequalities among young Italians. |
| Keywords: | youth occupational outcomes, precarious employment, family of origin, Italy |
| JEL: | D6 J2 |
| Date: | 2015–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_998_15&r=his |
| By: | Stephen P Jenkins |
| Abstract: | This paper describes the UK income distribution and how it has evolved over the last 50 years. It also includes some comparisons with the income distributions of other rich countries. Multiple perspectives on the distribution are provided: there is evidence about real income levels and inequality, and the prevalence of affluence and of poverty. |
| Keywords: | Inequality, poverty, affluence, income distribution, United Kingdom |
| JEL: | D31 I32 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:sticas:/186&r=his |
| By: | Johan Fourie and Christie Swanepoel |
| Abstract: | To estimate the long-term, persistent effects of missionary education requires two strong assumptions: that mission station settlement is uncorrelated with other economic variables, such as soil quality and access to markets, and 2) that selection into (and out of) mission stations is unimportant. Both these assumptions are usually not sufficiently addressed, which renders the interpretation of the persistent effects of mission stations suspect. We use an 1849 mission census of the Cape Colony in South Africa to test whether, controlling for location and selection, mission station education can explain education outcomes 147 years later. Our first set of results show that Black and Coloured residents of districts with a mission station are today likely to attain more years of schooling than those in districts with no stations. In addition, when only modern-day controls are included, education seems to be the mechanism that explains this persistence. However, when we control for selection in 1849, literacy loses its explanatory power. Education outcomes may be highly persistent – even in the face of active repression by apartheid authorities – but the key factor is early selection and not education persistence. |
| Keywords: | Missionaries, South Africa, Protestant, Cape Colony |
| JEL: | N37 I25 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rza:wpaper:491&r=his |
| By: | Luis A. Gil-Alana (University of Navarra, Pamplona, Spain ); Goodness C. Aye (Department of Economics, University of Pretoria ); Rangan Gupta (Department of Economics, University of Pretoria ) |
| Abstract: | The study proposes an alternative modelling specification for the real prices of gold and silver that allows the long run trend and cyclical behaviour to be modelled simultaneously by incorporating two differencing parameter in a fractional integration framework. However, we also consider the separate cases of a standard I(d) process, with a pole or singularity at the zero frequency and a cyclical I(d) model that incorporates a single pole in the spectrum at a non-zero frequency. We use annual data spanning from 1833 to 2013for gold and 1792 to 2013 for silver. Based on the more flexible model that permits a pole at both zero (trend) and non-zero (cycle) frequencies, we find that in general the estimates associated to the long run or zero frequency appear to be above 1 in case of gold and below 1 for silver, while the order of integration associated with the cyclical frequency is slightly above 0 in the majority of the cases in the two series. Further, higher orders of integration are associated to the long run component compared with the cyclical one. The implications for these findings are highlighted. |
| Keywords: | Gold and Silver Prices, Cycles, Persistence, Long memory |
| JEL: | C22 Q02 |
| Date: | 2015–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pre:wpaper:201507&r=his |
| By: | Forte, Francesco ; Silvestri, Paolo |
| Abstract: | The present dictionary entry aims to provide an account of Luigi Einaudi's life, thought and works |
| Keywords: | Luigi Einaudi |
| JEL: | B3 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:62319&r=his |
| By: | Markus Poschke (McGill University, Montreal ); Baris Kaymak (Universite de Montreal ) |
| Abstract: | Over the last 40 years the US tax system went through striking changes that considerably reduced the progressivity of the system. This resulted in a dramatic reduction of effective tax rates on top income groups. This paper investigates the macroeconomic repercussions of this change in tax policy, particularly for the distributions of income, wealth, consumption and welfare. |
| Date: | 2014 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:red:sed014:1054&r=his |
| By: | Jenkins, Stephen P. |
| Abstract: | This chapter describes the UK income distribution and how it has evolved over the last 50 years. It also includes some comparisons with the income distributions of other rich countries. Multiple perspectives on the distribution are provided: there is evidence about real income levels and inequality, and the prevalence of affluence and of poverty. |
| Date: | 2015–02–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ese:iserwp:2015-01&r=his |