Was malthus right? a var analysis of economic and demographic interactions in pre-industrial England

This paper shows that the interaction between economic and demographic variables in England before the onset of modern economic growth did not fit some crucial assumptions of the Malthusian model. I estimated a vector autoregression for data on fertility, nuptiality, mortality and real wages over the period 1541-1840 applying a well-known identification strategy broadly used in macroeconomics. The results show that endogenous adjustment of population to real wages functioned as Malthus assumed only until the 17th century: positive checks disappeared during the 17th century and preventive checks disappeared before 1740. This implies that the endogenous adjustment of population levels to changes in real wages -one of the cornerstones of the Malthusian model- did not work during an important part of the period usually considered within the "Malthusian regime"

Adult mortality and investment: a new explanation of the English agricultural productivity in the 18th century

We claim that the exogenous decline of adult mortality at the end of the seventeenth century can be one of the causes driving both the decline of interest rate and the increase in agricultural production per acre in preindustrial England. Following the intuition of the life-cycle hypothesis, we show that the increase in adult life expectancy must have implied less farmer impatience and it could have caused more investment in nitrogen stock and land fertility, and higher production per acre. We analyse this dynamic interaction using an overlapping generation model and show that the evolution of agricultural production and capital rates of return predicted by the model coincide fairly well with their empirical pattern

Adult mortality and investment: a new explanation of the English agricultural productivity in the 18th century.

We claim that the exogenous decline of adult mortality at the end of the seventeenth century can be one of the causes driving both the decline of interest rate and the increase in agricultural production per acre in preindustrial England. Following the intuition of the life-cycle hypothesis, we show that the increase in adult life expectancy must have implied less farmer impatience and it could have caused more investment in nitrogen stock and land fertility, and higher production per acre. We analyse this dynamic interaction using an overlapping generation model and show that the evolution of agricultural production and capital rates of return predicted by the model coincide fairly well with their empirical pattern.

WAS MALTHUS RIGHT? A VAR ANALYSIS OF ECONOMIC AND DEMOGRAPHIC INTERACTIONS IN PRE-INDUSTRIAL ENGLAND

This paper shows that the interaction between economic and demographic variables in England before the onset of modern economic growth did not fit some crucial assumptions of the Malthusian model. I estimated a vector autoregression for data on fertility, nuptiality, mortality and real wages over the period 1541-1840 applying a well-known identification strategy broadly used in macroeconomics. The results show that endogenous adjustment of population to real wages functioned as Malthus assumed only until the 17th century: positive checks disappeared during the 17th century and preventive checks disappeared before 1740. This implies that the endogenous adjustment of population levels to changes in real wages -one of the cornerstones of the Malthusian model- did not work during an important part of the period usually considered within the “Malthusian regime”.

A methodological approach to estimating the money demand in pre-industrial economies: probate inventories and Spain in the 18th century

The study of monetary phenomena and the understanding of price determination in Modern Europe are too often limited by the scarcity of good-quality data sets on the evolution across time of variables like money holdings, income, or wealth. In this paper we show that the information contained in probate inventories can be extremely useful to circumvent that problem. In particular, combining a data set of 114 inventories from Palencia (North of Spain) between 1750 and 1770 with census information (Catastro de Ensenada) we make a cross-section estimation of a money demand which is the first one ever produced for any period before the 19th century. The results provide meaningful insights about the relation between money demand and wealth, urbanization and structural change in a pre-industrial economy and highlight the potential of probate inventories to improve our knowledge of the monetary history of Modern Europe

A Methodological approach to estimating the Money Demand in Pre-Industrial Economies: Probate Inventories and Spain in the 18th century

The study of monetary phenomena and the understanding of price determination in Modern Europe are too often limited by the scarcity of good-quality data sets on the evolution across time of variables like money holdings, income, or wealth. In this paper we show that the information contained in probate inventories can be extremely useful to circumvent that problem. In particular, combining a data set of 114 inventories from Palencia (North of Spain) between 1750 and 1770 with census information (Catastro de Ensenada) we make a cross-section estimation of a money demand which is the first one ever produced for any period before the 19th century. The results provide meaningful insights about the relation between money demand and wealth, urbanization and structural change in a pre-industrial economy and highlight the potential of probate inventories to improve our knowledge of the monetary history of Modern Europe.

Inequality in Early Modern Spain: New evidence from the Ensenada Cadastre in Castile, c. 1750

This chapter addresses income inequality by offering new evidence based on the Ensenada Cadastre, a unique database on Castilian households circa 1750. We find that inequality in 18th-century Spain was substantial, especially in urban and/or highly populated areas. There was also a positive – but somewhat weaker – relationship not only between inequality and per capita income but also between inequality and poverty. We posit that extreme economic inequality was likely responsible for numerous episodes of social conflict. Finally, the extent of formalized charity and social spending was less than in other Western European regions.This project was supported by a grant from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad and FEDER (HAR2016-77794-R)

Chapter Inequality in Early Modern Spain: New evidence from the Ensenada Cadastre in Castile, c. 1750

This chapter addresses income inequality by offering new evidence based on the Ensenada Cadastre, a unique database on Castilian households circa 1750. We find that inequality in 18th-century Spain was substantial, especially in urban and/or highly populated areas. There was also a positive – but somewhat weaker – relationship not only between inequality and per capita income but also between inequality and poverty. We posit that extreme economic inequality was likely responsible for numerous episodes of social conflict. Finally, the extent of formalized charity and social spending was less than in other Western European regions

Comparing income and wealth inequality in pre-industrial economies: The case of Castile (Spain) in the eighteenth century

Most research on inequality in pre-industrial economies has focused on either wealth or income, generating not readily comparable results. In this paper,we use a unique data set of Spain circa 1750 including information on (among other things) wealth and income for the same sample of households. Our findings provide methodological insights showing that a household’s position in the income distribution is strongly correlated with its position in the wealth distribution but is also influenced by several other household specific characteristics like human capital of the head of the household and the economic sector of her/his main occupation.Both authors acknowledge financial support from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad and FEDER through grant HAR2016-77794-R. Esteban A. Nicolini acknowledges financial support from Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología, Argentina, through PICT 2429-2013

Persistence vs. Reversal and Agglomeration Economies vs. Natural Resources. Regional inequality in Argentina in the first half of the twentieth century

The economic performance of Argentina in the long run is quite usually divided in two periods: in the first one (1870-1914) we observe openness, low levels of public intervention and rapid growth in relative terms, while in the second (1914-1970) we observe relative economic slowdown together with inward looking policies and higher levels of public intervention. While there are many reconstructions of the evolution of main macroeconomic variables at a national aggregate level since the second half of the nineteenth century and many descriptions of the sectorial dimensions of this process, the available information about its provincial or regional dimensions is very scarce. In this paper we present an estimation of the GDPs of the twenty four provinces in Argentina in 1914 which is the first consistent and comparable estimation of this variable for any period before the 1950s. Our results confirm the standard view that most of the economic activity at the end of the period of the first globalization is located in the central area of the country and, in particular, in the province and city of Buenos Aires which seems to have been a quite important pole of economic activity; however, we also show that some peripheral areas in Patagonia, with very low population density, are quite affluent in per capita terms suggesting that resource abundance was an important factor to explain levels of income per capita. The comparison of the relative incomes per capita of the provinces in 1914 with the available data for 1953 suggest a remarkable stability and indicates that in this period there were no signs of reversal of income but rather persistence or even divergence.Esteban Nicolini acknowledges financial support by Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through Project ECO2011-25713 and CIUNT through subsidy 26/F410. María Florencia Aráoz acknowledges financial support by Spanish Ministry of Economy through project ECO2012-39169-C03-03. Both authors thanks continuous financial support by the Universidad del Norte Santo Tomás de Aquino and financial support by Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología –Argentina through PICT 2429-2013