Protecting infant industries: Canadian manufacturing and the national policy, 1870–1913

Infant industry protection has been the cornerstone of a debate on tariff policy that extends at least from the eighteenth century to the current day. In contrast to traditional neo-classical models of international trade that imply net negative effects, industrial organization and learning-by-doing trade models describe how protective tariffs can encourage output expansion, productivity improvement, and price reductions. Taking Canada's 1879 National Policy as a natural experiment, we explore the effect of a policy that substantially increased tariff protection to some, but not all, Canadian manufacturing industries. Using treatment intensity and difference-in-differences approaches, we find strong support for the predictions of the new trade models. After 1879, industries that received greater protection experienced faster growth in output and productivity, as well as larger price reductions. The industries targeted by the National Policy also exhibited greater returns to scale and faster learning rates. These results have important implications for the infant-industry debate in addition to addressing a central theme in Canadian economic history,     

INFRASTRUCTURE POLICY IN INDONESIA, 1965–2015: A SURVEY

This survey, first, provides an overview of the main developments in the infrastructure sector in Indonesia during the past five decades and, second, considers what the main policy and management bottlenecks in infrastructure appear to be. The overview of main developments indicates that, in broad terms, most parts of the sector have expanded considerably but that the needs remain acute for further expansion and for attention to the maintenance of existing facilities. Demand for infrastructure is high, especially since the regulated prices set for infrastructure services are often low. Access is often difficult, however, because of shortages of infrastructure, and quality is often unsatisfactory because of poor maintenance and indifferent management. These problems of access are exacerbated by the regulation of prices. This overview also points to the markedly different performances of industries in which pro-competitive policies have been applied and those in which more traditional policies of close regulation have restricted the operation of markets.     

Recovery from financial crises in peripheral economies, 1870–1913

What drives recoveries after financial crises? I address this question for the 1870–1913 “first era of globalization,” focusing on whether trade policy changes or positive movements in commodity prices played a bigger role in stimulating output growth after financial crises in peripheral economies. At this time before governments had modern fiscal and monetary policy tools to use while responding to crises protectionism was one of the few national-level policy options available for shaping economic activity. Improving terms of trade is another major factor that could influence output growth in the commodity-exporting countries included in this analysis. While previous studies of this period have looked at longer-run associations between these explanatory variables and economic growth, I focus on the aftermath of crises, and find that tariff rate increases had a positive impact on GDP per capita growth, while positive terms of trade changes did not have a significant effect on output growth. This suggests that governments played a substantial role in shaping post-crisis recoveries during this period.     

Changes in the demographics of American inventors, 1870–1940

We assemble a novel dataset linking inventors listed in the Annual Reports of the Commissioner of Patents to Population Census records spanning 1870 to 1940. We find that inventors are not a random subset of the population. They differ in some unsurprising ways in that they tend to be older, whiter, and more likely male. However, these patterns do change over time. The odds ratio relative to the population as a whole of female inventors increases from a low of 0.07 in 1880 to a high of 0.13 in 1940 and that of non-whites ranges from 0.16 in 1880 to 0.34 in 1940. Both populations remain severely underrepresented throughout the timeframe. We find changes in the occupations of inventors with trends away from farming and towards white collar occupations. We also show the increasing importance of foreign born people in patenting. In 1870, the odds of a foreign born person patenting relative to the population as a whole is nearly 1 and increases to over 1.6 by 1940.     

Ebb and flow: Structural and spatial change in Victoria's brewing industry, 1870–1900

The brewing industry has undergone profound structural and spatial change over the last 150 years. We examine how consolidation began in Victoria's brewing industry using a historical GIS approach. We argue that industry restructuring was shaped by four interlocking dynamics between 1870 and 1900: (1) structural economic change; (2) railway development; (3) technological innovation; and (4) regulatory reform. We show that the ebb and flow of these interacting dynamics generated a non-linear process of change. Similar to North America and Europe, the industry became highly concentrated. However, this process was complicated by local factors such as climate, economy, and distance.     

LABOUR PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN THE LONG RUN: JAPAN, 1600–1909

This article examines long-term labour productivity change in Japan from the early seventeenth century to the nineteenth century. We constructed sectoral labour force estimates based on the methodology presented in a previous study, who provided a sectoral GDP series covering the Tokugawa period. Our results show the industrial structure in the Tokugawa period remained relatively stable in comparison with the economy after the Meiji Restoration. Nevertheless, the estimates of sectoral labour productivity suggest expansion of the market economy in Tokugawa Japan influenced the development of industrialisation after the Meiji Restoration.     

Stadiums and Scheduling: Measuring Deadweight Losses in the Victorian Football League, 1920–70

Over a 50 year period, Australian Rules football's major league, the Victorian Football League, did not always use its largest and best-equipped stadium for regular season games between its most popular teams or schedule those teams to play twice in a regular season. We calculate deadweight losses from the use of capital goods (stadiums) and effects of match scheduling in this professional sports league. Such analysis has not been attempted previously because of the absence of a counterfactual. The welfare losses were significant but not sufficient to threaten the survival of a distance-protected cartel.     

Socioeconomic status and judicial disparities in England and Wales, 1870–1910

In a criminal sentencing system based on optimal deterrence, groups will receive different average sentences based on disparities in conviction probabilities, with longer prison sentences balancing more frequent acquittals. A taste-based model makes no such prediction. I compare these models using trial records from England and Wales in 1870, 1883, and 1910, years with extensive jury trials and broad latitude in sentencing for judges. In the earlier years, higher status defendants accused of property crimes receive substantially longer sentences, with no such difference for violent crimes. In contrast, higher status defendants are less likely to be convicted at trial, both when accused of property crimes and of violent crimes. In a Heckman selection empirical model, selection into sentencing has a large effect on the magnitude of these sentencing patterns. For property crimes, there is negative selection on unobservable traits, possibly explained by using imperfect proxies for social class. I conclude that an optimal sentencing and deterrence model is more supported for property crimes than for violent ones, with judges balancing disparate rates of conviction from juries.     

The role of the engineer in Danish modernisation, 1850–1920

Abstract

The article attempts to assess the role of engineers in the modernisation of Denmark in the period 1850 to 1920. Using both quantitative and qualitative evidence, it argues that though it is hardly possible in absolute terms to measure the influence of the engineers, it is possible to reach some indicative conclusions.

By looking at the position before 1850 and the periods 1850–1890 and 1890–1920 and using statistics on the employment of the engineers graduating from Polyteknisk Lareanstalt in Copenhagen, it is clear that these professional engineers affected society in a number of ways. The influence of engineers on the growing Danish industry has hitherto been presumed to be only minor. but this view needs some correction. As early as the 1870s and 1880s professional engineers played an important part in the largest Danish industrial firms, and prior to that held important positions in the new, technologically-pioneering, Danish industries. Danish engineers also influenced the State s telegraph service, the railways, gas- and water works, and town planning.

That, too, a considerable number of the early graduates from Polyteknisk: Lcereanstalt worked as teachers had no small importance, as, until some time after the mid nineteenth century, the teaching of the natural sciences in Denmark was sporadic and of uneven quality.     

Eila Linnanmäki,Espanjantauti Suomessa. Influenssaepidemia 1918–1920

Abstract

Economic historians are familiar with the conflict in their work between, on the one hand, phenomenological analysis based upon or, more precisely, guided by modern economic theory, and on the other, causal analysis, of a kind common to all historical disciplines, but operating within the special conceptual framework and terminology of economics. The conflict becomes more apparent as one moves backward in time, simply because knowledge of the facts usually decreases until a point is reached where economic theory has to take the place of facts. Since economic theory is mainly derived from a large body of data drawn from recent times, it is obviously necessary to use very great care when applying modern theory to the anlysis of economic data drawn from the past.     

‘Australian sailors wanted’: Labour supply and Australian shipping,c. 1870–c. 1914

In the pre-1914 era Australia did not develop an ocean-going merchant navy. The problem is well recognised in previous studies that assumed that it was high Australian wages that made the operational cost of deep-sea vessels uncompetitive on a global scale. This article reconstructs historical shifts in the Australian market for a seagoing workforce and demonstrates there was low recruitment of Australian labour. Drawing on new sources and inspired by efficiency wage theory the article argues that it was this shortage of a domestic labour supply that constrained the development of a national deep-sea shipping industry.     

Updated estimates of UK GDP from the income side, 1841–1920

This article brings together some of the improvements to GDP estimates from the income side since the publication of Charles Feinstein's 1972 volume National income, expenditure and output of the United Kingdom, 1855–1965. Many of the improvements and refinements were made by Feinstein himself and this paper makes a start in bringing the different elements together, focusing chiefly on reconstructing the income-based estimates for the period 1841–1920. The new data are then used to comment on several features of the late nineteenth-century UK economy, considering both the trend and cyclical path of the economy. The new data, coupled with modern de-trending methods, suggest that there was a long-term slowing of the UK economy from the late nineteenth century, starting from the 1870s. To undertake the trend–cycle decomposition, we employ a wavelets methodology to describe the time–varying features of trends and cycles over this period.     

Railways and the Exploitation of Victoria's Forests, 1880s–1920s

Railways made a large contribution to the expansion of Victoria's economy, and in the process enabled and drove environmental change. This article focuses on one industry, forestry. It first examines railway demand for timber in construction and maintenance, particularly for sleepers. This demand caused tensions – a bitter dispute in the 1890s between the Railways Department and the Conservator of Forests, George Perrin, over timber cut on state land led to uneasy co-existence after the turn of the century. Railways not only required timber but also carried commercial quantities in bulk, providing forest industries with access to profitable markets – in particular firewood, the significance of which has been underappreciated previously. Forest products contributed substantially to railway revenue, representing a more stable source of income than other major categories of freight such as wheat, wool, and coal.     

Networks and Scientific Integrity: Eli Heckscher and the Construction of Economic History in Sweden, 1920–1950

Abstract

This article deals with the US government's efforts to curb the Swedish ball bearing producer SKF's exports to the East early in the Cold War, 1950–1952, and interprets this process within the framework of hegemony theory. In doing this, the article makes use of previously unutilised US archival material. The period up to mid-1951 saw increasing US pressure upon Sweden and SKF to consent to US hegemony by abiding by the Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (CoCom) embargo. To achieve its objectives US policymakers developed a flexible ‘carrot and stick’ approach, and the article adds considerable detail regarding the US government's handling of SKF. US tolerance and flexibility was dependent upon Swedish consent to American hegemony in Western Europe, which was received through the signing of the Stockholm agreement – a hegemonic apparatus through which Sweden's abidance by the embargo was handled – in mid-June 1951. A small amount of exports was accepted by Washington as long as the main US objective – to deny the Eastern Bloc strategic technology – was adhered to by SKF. The article also reveals the lack of policy coordination in the Swedish government, and the conflicts between the government and SKF regarding the responsibility for adhering to the embargo.     

Emigration from the United Kingdom to the United States,Canada and Australia/New Zealand, 1870–1913: Quantity and quality

This paper revisits the determinants of emigration from the United Kingdom to the United States, Canada and Australia/New Zealand from 1870 to 1913. In the absence of restrictive immigration policies, the flow of emigration to these destinations responded to economic shocks and trends. Emigrants to Australia and New Zealand were more skilled on average than those heading across the Atlantic, a feature that does not correspond well with skill differentials in the manner predicted by the Roy model. While assisted passages (subsidised fares) increased the volume of emigration to Australia and New Zealand they cannot account for its higher skill content.