The compulsory public pension and the demand for life insurance: the case of Sweden, 1884–1914

We employ cost‐of‐living surveys, business archives, and firm data to examine the impact of the compulsory pension on the demand for life insurance in Sweden from 1884 to 1914—a period that covers the implementation of the first public compulsory old‐age pension reform and the take‐off of industry life insurance. As predicted on the basis of the contemporary literature on crowding‐out effects, we find that the compulsory pension reduced the demand for life insurance. Our panel‐data analysis of lapse rates on insurance policies shows a significant crowding‐out effect of pension payments. We conclude that the introduction of the general compulsory pension had a crowding‐out effect on households’ holdings of insurance policies.     

Living standards and plague in London, 1560–1665

This article uses individual records of 930,000 burials and 630,000 baptisms to reconstruct the spatial and temporal patterns of birth and death in London from 1560 to 1665, a period dominated by recurrent plague. The plagues of 1563, 1603, 1625, and 1665 appear of roughly equal magnitude, with deaths running at five to six times their usual rate, but the impact on wealthier central parishes falls markedly through time. Tracking the weekly spread of plague, we find no evidence that plague emerged first in the docks, and in many cases elevated mortality emerges first in the poor northern suburbs. Looking at the seasonal pattern of mortality, we find that the characteristic autumn spike associated with plague continued into the early 1700s. Natural increase improved as smaller crises disappeared after 1590, but fewer than half of those born survived childhood.     

Road transport productivity in the sixteenth‐century Low Countries: the case of Brabant, 1450–1650†

Though there is a consensus that transport plays a central role in economic development, for the period before the eighteenth century there is a lack of strategic information for assessing the importance of road transport productivity changes in economic development. Transport prices in particular are crucial missing pieces of the puzzle. Sources rarely reveal information that meets the standards of reliable price history. However, it is possible to create a reliable transport price series on the basis of the transport of millstones to ducal mills in Brabant. Assessing the impact of the ‘transport productivity changes’ that can be inferred from this transport price series is a hazardous exercise. Moreover, as Masschaele has observed, land transport prices closely match general agricultural price trends. Land transport was essentially an agricultural service, determined both by cost (especially horse provender) and income effects. Transport price inflation was not demand‐led. However, while transport did not impede urbanization and economic growth, conversely, in sixteenth‐century Brabant—a highly urbanized region that experienced considerable growth in the volume of land transport—no significant land transport productivity gains were achieved.     

Monetization and the behavior of velocity in Sweden, 1871–1913

The income velocity of money declined sharply in Sweden between the 1870's and the outbreak of World War I. This decline is explained by a monetization process. An account of this process is given focusing on (a) the growth of commercial banking, (b) changes in wage contracts and in labor markets, and (c) changes in exchange arrangements in the markets for goods. A number of proxy measures of the spreading use of money are presented and included in regressions on velocity. The influence of the monetization variables is compared to the effects of the standard explanatory variables in money demand studies, that is, of real income and interest rates. The econometric results support the view that monetization variables significantly contributed to the fall in velocity. These results question the luxury-good hypothesis of money, suggesting that the standard approach of including real income as an explanatory variable in money demand studies covering long spans of time runs the risk of ignoring important determinants of the secular behavior of velocity.     

Marriage seasonality and the industrious revolution: southern Sweden, 1690–18951

In this article we study the evolution of marriage seasonality in relation to economic change, particularly connected to changes in labour supply and work intensity of the kind implied by the ‘industrious revolution’. The focus is on southern Sweden in 1685–1894, which was a period of agricultural transformation and early industrialization, when we would expect to see an increase in work intensity. The analysis is based on about 120,000 marriages from 117 different parishes. The analysis shows that the seasonality of marriage changed dramatically over time, from a classic grain production pattern, with a marriage peak in late spring and a marriage trough at harvest time, to a much more even seasonality, although with the appearance of a very strong peak in December. This change affected rural rather than urban areas, and was present regardless of differences in institutional settings, and for almost all occupational groups below the elite. The changed seasonality pattern is consistent with increasing work intensity over the year, leaving only the weeks around Christmas as a low season. In addition to the increase in work intensity, the privatization of marriage and the availability of time and resources were also important factors in the changing seasonality pattern.     

Credit,reputation, and masculinity in British urban commerce: Edinburgh,c. 1710–70 1

This article draws on cases of public insult from the Edinburgh consistory court to explore constructions of credit and reputation during the eighteenth century. Scotland's unique legal context offers new insights into the honour of men and women, replacing the received view that female honour was almost entirely about sexual honour and complicating our understanding of male honour among the middling sort. In contrast to studies that view the credit of men and women as principally contradictory, this study instead identifies significant points of both overlap and divergence in male and female reputation and discusses honour as a family matter. Unlike in England, levels of defamation litigation in Scotland remained high through the eighteenth century, and both the social composition of defamation litigants and the types of insult they brought to court remained consistent. However, the forms and settings of disputes over honour changed, reflecting the interiorization of conflict as the eighteenth century progressed.     

Long‐term trends in economic inequality: the case of the Florentine state,c. 1300–1800

This article provides an overview of economic inequality, particularly of wealth, in the Florentine state (Tuscany) from the early fourteenth to the late eighteenth century. Regional studies of this kind are rare, and this is only the second‐ever attempt at covering such a long period. Consistent with recent research conducted on other European areas, during the early modern period we find clear indications of a tendency for economic inequality to grow continually, a finding that for Tuscany cannot be explained as the consequence of economic growth. Furthermore, the exceptionally old sources we use allow us to demonstrate that a phase of declining inequality, lasting about one century, was triggered by the Black Death from 1348 to 1349. This finding challenges earlier scholarship and significantly alters our understanding of the economic consequences of the Black Death.     

The agricultural revolution and the conditions of the rural poor,southern Sweden, 1750–1860

The social consequences of agrarian change have been widely debated. The traditional view of the lower classes becoming increasingly vulnerable due to the loss of access to resources has been met with the revisionist view that this change was counteracted by an increase in the volume and regularity of employment due to investments and new farming practices. This article address this issue by studying the agricultural revolution in southern Sweden using aggregate data at the parish level. New micro‐level data on actual harvest outcomes, supplemented by price data, make it possible to differentiate between the development of the local economy and exogenous price shocks. Our results indicate a clear mortality response to harvest fluctuations in general and to harvest failures in particular. The response differed greatly between farming regions, being strongest in the areas most dependent on grain production. The response also diminished during the agricultural revolution, indicating the increasing efficiency of the local economy. This indicates employment effects in line with the revisionist view. At the same time, vulnerability to fluctuations in prices of basic foodstuffs remained high until the second half of the nineteenth century and was also quite similar across farming regions.     

Intra-industry trade : The case of Sweden

Zusammenfassung Intraindustrieller Handel: Das Beispiel Schwedens. — In diesem Aufsatz werden einige Hypothesen überprüft, die den Anteil des intraindustriellen Handels am gesamten Au\enhandel Schwedens mit verschiedenen L?ndern und Produkten der Jahre 1970 und 1977 erkl?ren sollen. Ein wichtiges Ergebnis ist, da\ der Anteil des intraindustriellen Handels am Warenaustausch mit solchen L?ndern besonders gro\ zu sein pflegt, deren Faktorausstattung und Pro-KopfEinkommen ungef?hr denen Schwedens entsprechen. Au\erdem nahm der intraindustrielle Handel zwischen 1970 und 1977 mit den L?ndern besonders stark zu, die sich am schnellsten dem schwedischen Einkommensniveau ann?herten. Ein anderes wichtiges Ergebnis ist, da\ der Anteil des intraindustriellen Handels bei den Produktgruppen in der Regel recht gro\ ist, deren Herstellung charakterisiert ist durch — einen niedrigen Mechanisierungsgrad, gemessen entweder an einer geringen Energieintensit?t oder einem hohen Anteil der Lohnkosten, was darauf hindeutet, da\ die Produkte nicht standardisiert sind. — hohe Kosten für E & F und einen hohen Anteil gelernter und gut bezahlter Arbeitskr?fte, was als ein Zeichen für eine hohe Innovationsrate und einen gro\en Bestand an firmenspezifischen technischen Kenntnissen angesehen wird, wodurch der Handel infolge einer technologischen Lücke intensiviert wird, und durch — eine Konzentration auf gro\e Betriebe, was auf Skalenertr?ge hindeuten k?nnte.

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Résumé Le commerce intra-industriel: Le cas suédois. — Dans cet article, on a examiné quelques hypothèses concernant la quote-part du commerce intra-industriel en commerce total avec des pays et des biens différents en utilisant des données pour le commerce suédois des années 1970 et 1977. Les résultats principaux sont, premièrement, que la quote-part du commerce intra-industriel semble être haute en commerce avec les pays dont la dotation en facteurs de production et le revenu per capita sont à peu près similaires à ceux de la Suède. De plus, le commerce intraindustriel s’augmentait le plus entre 1970 et 1977 avec les pays qui s’approchaient le plus rapidement du niveau de revenu suédois. Deuxièmement, la quote-part du commerce intra-industriel semble être haute pour les groupes des biens dont la production est caractérisée par — un degré bas de mécanisation, mesuré par une intensité basse d’énergie ou par une quote-part haute des co?ts de main-d’oeuvre, qui peut indiquer que les biens ne sont pas standardisés. — des co?ts hauts de R&D et par une quote-part haute de la main-d’oeuvre qualifiée et bien rémunérée, qui peuvent être interprétés comme indicateurs d’un taux haut d’innovation et d’un grand stock du savoir-faire spécifique de l’entreprise, intensifiant le commerce de la lacune technologique, et par — une concentration dans des grandes usines qui peut être un indicateur des économies d’échelle.

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Resumen Comercio intra-industrial: el caso de Suecia. — En este articulo se someten a prueba algunas hipótesis concernientes a la participación del comercio intra-industrial en el comercio total con diferentes países y en diferentes grupos de productos, sobre datos del comercio sueco para los a?os 1970 y 1977. Los principales resultados son, primeramente, que la participación del comercio intra-industrial tiende a ser alto en el comercio con paises donde la dotación de factores y el ingreso per cápita son bastante similares a los de Suecia. Además, el comercio intra-industrial creció más entre los a?os 1970 y 1977 con aquellos países que se estaban acercando más rápidamente al nivel de ingresos sueco. Segundo, la participación del comercio intra-industrial tiende a ser alta en grupos de productos caracterizados por — bajo grado de mecanización, medido por una baja intensidad en energia o una alta participación de costos laborales, lo que puede indicar que los productos no estan estandardizados. — altos costos de investigación y desarrollo (R&D) y alta participación de mano de obra calificada y altamente remunerada, lo que se interpréta como un signo de alto grado de innovaciones y un amplio stock de conocimientos técnicos específicos de la empresa, creando comercio de brecha tecnológica. — concentración hacia grandes plantas, lo que puede ser un signo de economías de escala.

     

Manorial economy and corvée labour in southern Sweden 1650–1850*

This essay is an inquiry into manorial production in Scania. Its growth was dependent on the long‐term development of European grain prices. When prices increased landlords were encouraged to put more land under the plough. The estates’ main income came, to an increasing extent, from demesne production, which finally dominated the income profile. The peasants’ most important contribution to the landlords became, in most cases, their corvée labour, and their uncertain tenure rights were illustrated with great clarity in the continuing evictions, which were accelerated in the nineteenth century with the aim of expanding the demesne.