Global migration in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries: the unstoppable force of demography

Review of World Economics - This paper sheds light on the global migration patterns of the past 40 years, and produces migration projections for the 21st century. To do this, we build a simple...     

The veterinary medicine industry in Britain in the twentieth century

Economic historians have focused research effort on accounting for the growth and significance of Britain's pharmaceutical industry, but little effort has so far been directed at the veterinary medicine industry, which formed an important part of the wider sector. This article addresses that gap. Factors responsible for that sector's relative insignificance until the 1950s included a general tendency to slaughter rather than to treat sick animals, the absence of advanced medicines until the innovation of sulpha drugs and antibiotics, and difficult relations with the wider pharmaceutical industry. Thereafter output of veterinary medicines increased dramatically, arising from an exponential growth in the demand for intensively farmed poultry meat. Since the 1980s a decline in the use of drugs in agriculture has caused the industry to concentrate on the health needs of domestic animals rather than those of livestock.     

Entrepreneurs,formalization of social ties,and trustbuilding in Europe (fourteenth to twentieth centuries)1

The establishment of trust is a key component of economic activity and social ties can make business dealings work better. However, we do not know much about how economic actors created new social ties deliberately in order to pursue their objectives. This article analyses the way in which merchants and entrepreneurs used specific rituals to establish formal social ties, with the intent of protecting their business relationships. It focuses on relational instruments that until now had been neglected, particularly godparenthood and marriage witnessing. It shows that formalization, ritualization, and publicity of ties were used by entrepreneurs to establish trust with their business associates, for example when information was asymmetric or when institutions were perceived as inefficient in guaranteeing mutual good behaviour. The analysis covers a long period, from the late middle ages to today. It pays particular attention to the consequences of the Reformation in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and of the industrial revolution in the nineteenth. Contrary to the received wisdom, it suggests that formal social ties such as godparenthood continued to play an important role in economic activity during and after the industrial revolution. New databases on early modern Italy and nineteenth‐century France are used.     

New evidence and new methods to measure human capital inequality before and during the industrial revolution: France and the US in the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries

We explore pre‐ and early industrial inequality of numeracy using the age heaping method and anthropometric strategies. For France, we map differential numeracy between the upper and lower segments of a sample population for 26 regions during the seventeenth century. For the US, inequality of numeracy is estimated for 25 states during the 19th century. Testing the hypothesis of a negative impact of inequality on welfare growth, we find evidence that lower inequality increased industrial development in the US, whereas for France such an effect was only evident in interactions with political variables such as proximity to central government.     

Were British railway companies well managed in the early twentieth century?1

This paper examines major privately owned British railway companies before the First World War. Quantitative evidence is presented on return on capital employed (ROCE), total factor productivity (TFP) growth, cost inefficiency, and speed of passenger services. There were discrepancies in performance across companies but ROCE and TFP typically fell during our period. Cost inefficiency rose before 1900 but then was brought under control as a profits collapse loomed. Without the discipline of either strong competition or effective regulation, managerial failure was common. This sector is an important qualification to the conventional wisdom that late Victorian Britain did not fail.     

How skilled were English agricultural labourers in the early nineteenth century?1

Using the wage accounts of two different farms in the 1830s and 1840s, matched with census records to determine the age of the workers, this article estimates age‐wage profiles for male and female agricultural labourers. Females earned less than males, and had less wage growth over their life cycles. Male wage profiles peaked at age 30–5, earlier than the wage profiles of workers today. Before the age of 30 wage growth was more rapid than increases in strength, but less rapid than wage growth among factory workers. If wage increases after the age of 20 indicate skill acquisition, then male agricultural labourers acquired a significant amount of skill, but less skill than contemporaneous factory workers.     

The reliability of the registration of births and deaths in Finland in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: Some examples

Abstract

Finland has an abundance of source materials for the study of historical demography. The best-known records are the two sets of tables: the census and mortality tables which were maintained by the parish clergy from 1749 onwards. These recorded the size of the population, to some extent its distribution, and the vital statistics of births, marriages and deaths. The various parish registers formed the basic material for these tables, and information about births and deaths was taken from the registers of births and deaths which exist for Finnish parishes in significant numbers after the Great Northern War (i.e. after 1721). Indeed, for some parishes such registers have survived from as early as the second half of the seventeenth century. Finland therefore has rich documentation available for research into fertility and mortality. However demographic research has previously concentrated upon the more accessible census data, while the registers of births and deaths have been relatively neglected.