Volume 75-Issue 4-November 2022
ISSUE INFORMATION
Pages 993-994
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13093
SYMPOSIUM - DEMOGRAPHIC SHOCKS
Introduction to the symposium on demographic shocks
Giovanni Federico
Pages 995-996
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13212
Short- and medium-run health and literacy impacts of the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic in Brazil
Amanda Guimbeau,Nidhiya Menon,Aldo Musacchio
Pages 997-1025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13155
Abstract: We study the lasting repercussions of the 1918 influenza (‘Spanish Flu’) pandemic on health measures and literacy rates in São Paulo, Brazil, the most populous city in South America today, but significantly poorer a century ago. Leveraging temporal and spatial variation in district-level estimates of influenza-related deaths for the 1917–20 time period, combined with a unique database on demographic and literacy outcomes as well as a detailed set of socio-economic, infrastructure, and regional determinants newly constructed from historical data, we find that the pandemic had significant impacts. In particular, infant mortality and stillbirths rose, sex ratios at birth fell, and there was a marked improvement in male literacy rates for those 15 years and above in 1920. Further analyses reveal that these impacts are most pronounced in districts with older populations, less literate districts, and districts where access to doctors was relatively limited. We find evidence that the male literacy effects persist in 1940. These results highlight that ramifications of the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic were experienced for at least two decades after the event in a context where institutions were relatively weak and resources for mitigation were limited.
Poverty, pollution, and mortality: The 1918 influenza pandemic in a developing German economy
Richard Franke
Pages 1026-1053
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13165
Abstract: The paper provides a detailed analysis of excess mortality during the ‘Spanish Flu’ in a developing German economy and the effect of poverty and air pollution on pandemic mortality. The empirical analysis is based on a difference-in-differences approach using annual all-cause mortality statistics at the parish level in the Kingdom of Württemberg. The paper complements the existing literature on urban pandemic severity with comprehensive evidence from mostly rural parishes. The results show that middle- and high-income parishes had a significantly lower increase in mortality rates than low-income parishes. Moreover, the mortality rate during the 1918 influenza pandemic was significantly higher in highly polluted parishes compared with least polluted parishes. Furthermore, the paper provides a detailed description of mortality statistics in Württemberg and new excess mortality rate estimates for Germany and its states.
Persistence of natural disasters on children's health: Evidence from the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923
Kota Ogasawara
Pages 1054-1082
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13135
Abstract: This study examines a catastrophic earthquake in 1923 to analyse the long-term effects of a natural disaster on children's health. The findings show that foetal exposure to Japan's Great Kantō Earthquake had stunting effects on girls in the devastated area. Disaster relief spending helped remediate stunting among boys by late primary school age, whereas it did not ameliorate girls’ stunting, which suggests a prenatal selection mechanism and compensating investment after birth. While maternal mental stress due to the fear of vibrations and anticipation of future aftershocks played a role in the adverse health effects, maternal nutritional stress via physical disruption also enhanced those effects.
ARTICLES
Cyberpunk Victoria: The credibility of computers and the first digital revolution, 1848–83
Marc Flandreau,Geoffroy Legentilhomme
Pages 1083-1119
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13134
Abstract: British capitalism was a knowledge economy that lived on reliable numerical information. We argue that human computers and the algorithms they used played a vital intermediation role and supported the growth of the British capital market, because they resolved digital information asymmetries. Given the lack of an archive for ‘Cyberpunk Victoria’, we demonstrate the computers’ role as financial intermediaries by identifying their imprint on the production of data by a prominent numerical factory, the Investor's Monthly Manual, a companion publication of the Economist. Our study underscores the import of digital mechanization and the relevance of human cybernetics to the development of financial capitalism.
Financing the rebuilding of the City of London after the Great Fire of 1666
D'Maris Coffman,Judy Z. Stephenson,Nathan Sussman
Pages 1120-1150
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13136
Abstract: This article presents archival data on rebuilding costs and interest rates from the Corporation of London, 1666–83, to analyse how, in the absence of banking or capital market finance, the London Corporation funded the rebuilding of London after the Great Fire. The City borrowed from its citizens and outside investors at rates much lower than previously thought to replace vital services and to support large improvement works. Lenders were reassured by the Corporation's reputation, and its borrowing was partly secured by future coal tax receipts. The records show that funding from these sources was forthcoming and would have covered the costs. Most of the rebuilding was completed in less than a decade; but having invested in public goods without generating the expected flows of income in the form of improved fees, fines, and rents, the City defaulted in 1683.
Property and inequality: Housing dynamics in a nineteenth-century city
Richard Rodger
Pages 1151-1181
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13138
Abstrac: The internal structure of the city is analysed through the ownership, tenancy, and management of residential property using assessed rents to reflect current market value. The analysis reveals the interactions of agents, institutions, and trusts, and explores ownership in terms of gender, absenteeism, occupational categories, portfolio sizes, and values. Rents are used to develop both an index of housing affordability according to occupations, and an index of dissimilarity in rental variations within and between streets to provide a nuanced and more realistic understanding of the internal dynamics of an entire city—Edinburgh. While empirical material underpinning the analysis is place-specific, the underlying urban processes and relationships are generalizable, and provide a comprehensive overview of residential property relationships.
Wool smuggling from England's eastern seaboard, c. 1337–45: An illicit economy in the late middle ages
Matt Raven
Pages 1182-1213
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13141
Abstract: The medieval English wool trade was a commercial activity of huge economic importance. The historiography of the medieval wool trade, however, has focused overwhelmingly on its legitimate side. This article uses the evidence of legal proceedings prosecuted in the royal courts to provide the first detailed account of wool smuggling in the fourteenth century, a time of heavy governmental regulation and hugely increased taxation. It demonstrates that a substantial number of merchants responded to these challenges by participating in a flourishing trade in smuggled wool which was considered a serious threat to crown fiscality. In particular, the article explores how smaller-scale smuggling took place along under-regulated areas of coastline away from customs ports; how major export operations were able to smuggle wool through the customs system itself; and how concerns over smuggling influenced a series of administrative reforms designed to improve the efficiency of commercial regulation.
Imperial preference before the Ottawa Agreements: Evidence from New Zealand's Preferential and Reciprocal Trade Act of 1903
Brian D. Varian
Pages 1214-1241
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13142
Abstract: In the Edwardian era, the British Dominions adopted policies of imperial preference amid a period of rising imports from the United States and industrial continental Europe. Hitherto, there has been no econometric assessment of whether these policies diverted the Dominions’ imports towards the Empire, as was intended. This article focuses on New Zealand's initial policy of imperial preference, codified in the Preferential and Reciprocal Trade Act of 1903. New Zealand's policy was unique insofar as it extended preference to only certain commodities and not others. Using propensity score matching, this study exploits the cross-commodity variation in the extension of preference and finds that, on the whole, the Preferential and Reciprocal Trade Act did not divert New Zealand's imports towards the Empire. However, for those few commodities receiving very high absolute margins of preference (20 per cent ad valorem), a statistically significant effect of the preferential policy is found. Altogether, this case study of New Zealand reveals a contrast between the Edwardian system of imperial preference and the trade-diverting system of imperial preference that resulted from the Ottawa Agreements of the interwar era.
New evidence on wine in French international trade (1848–1913): Import discrimination as export quality promotion
Stéphane Becuwe,Bertrand Blancheton,Samuel Maveyraud
Pages 1242-1269
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13156
Abstract: Using an original dataset and theoretical framework, this paper offers a reinterpretation of the French wine international trade after external shocks during wine globalisation based on trade policy. To maintain its external position, particularly after the arrival of phylloxera in the 1860s, French authorities promoted the development of Algerian vineyards by complex discrimination in tariffs. We highlight a negative relationship between discrimination in tariff policy and market share for wine trade partners to the detriment of Spain, Italy, and Portugal and in favour of Algeria. By combining a counterfactual analysis and two theoretical models, we consider Algeria as a new competitor in an imperfect competition. Moreover, using data of wine quality at a disaggregated level, we reveal that the control of imports by France allowed the diversification of the range of exports and maximisation of profits.
A new estimate of Chinese male occupational structure during 1734–1898 by sector, sub-sector pattern, and region
Cheng Yang
Pages 1270-1313
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13157
Abstract: Based on the Xingke Tiben, this paper assesses the long-run economic development of China, by constructing a new estimate of male occupational structure during 1734–1898 by sector, sub-sector pattern, and region. After assessing the source's biases, using this new empirical basis, this paper demonstrates that the national male occupational structure was nearly identical in 1761–70, 1821–30, and 1881–90, suggesting a long-lasting structural stasis of the national economy, allowing for fluctuations between benchmark dates. Within agriculture, substantial regional differences in labour organisation are revealed. Three distinct models are found: the Northern Regions model features a high usage of wage labour, the Yangtze Valley model presents a high level of tenancy development, and the Southern Regions model displays the highest share of landowners. All three models saw increasing use of wage labour in 1761–1890 and shrinking landownership in 1821–90. At the regional level, the long-run estimate for Lower Yangtze suggests that the region as a whole stagnated throughout the entire period, but the overall structural stasis hides dynamic, contrasting long-run economic change between the region's core and peripheral areas. Comparative analysis with England further suggests that the timing of the Great Divergence between China and England took place before 1734, even in the context of the regional difference.
Wealth inequality in pre-industrial England: A long-term view (late thirteenth to sixteenth centuries)
Guido Alfani,Hector García Montero
Pages 1314-1348
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13158
Abstract: This article provides an overview of wealth inequality in England from the late thirteenth to the sixteenth century, based on a novel database of distributions of taxable household wealth across 17 counties plus London. To account for high thresholds of fiscal exemption, a new method is introduced to reconstruct complete distributions from left-censored observations. First, we analyse inequality at the county level, finding an impressive stability across time in the relative position of the English counties, perturbed only by the tendency of the South and South-East to become relatively more inegalitarian. Then, we produce an aggregate distribution representative of England as a whole, and we detect an overall tendency for inequality to grow from medieval to early modern times due largely to North–South divergence in average household wealth. We discuss our results in the light of the recent literature on historical inequality.
Evolving gaps: Occupational structure in southern and northern Italy, 1400–1861
David Chilosi,Carlo Ciccarelli
Pages 1349-1378
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13159
Abstract: During the Risorgimento (1800–61), southern Italy was less industrial than central-northern Italy and initially agricultural provinces in the north saw rapid structural transformation. During the Renaissance (1400–1600), structural transformation in the south led to a near halving of the initial difference in agricultural employment share between the centre-north and the south, but convergence came to a halt with the ‘seventeenth-century crisis’. These trends suggest that regional inequality was evolving rather than persistent.
BOOK REVIEWS
Mark Koyama & Jared Rubin, How the World Became Rich: The Historical Origins of Economic Growth. Hoboken: Wiley, 2022. pp. 240. ISBN 9781509540235. Pbk £17.99
Johan Fourie
Pages 1379-1380
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13202
David Cox (ed.), Evesham Abbey and Local Society in the Late Middle Ages. The Abbot's Household Account 1456–7 and the Priors’ Registers 1520–40. Worcester: Worcester Archive and Archaeology Service, 2021. pp. 229. ISSN 01414577
Nick Peyton
Pages 1381-1382
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13206
Erin Woodruff Stone, Captives of Conquest: Slavery in the Early Modern Spanish Caribbean. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021. pp. 235. 3 maps. 3 figs. 7 tabs. ISBN 9780812253108. Hbk $49.95
Trevor Burnard
Pages 1382-1383
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13209
William D. Adler, Engineering Expansion: The U.S. Army and Economic Development 1787–1860. (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2021. Pp 232. 5 figs, 4 maps, 11 tabs. ISBN Hbk. 9780812253481 Hbk. $75 eBook. $75)
Carl Kitchens
Pages 1384-1385
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13201
Stana Nenadic, Craftworkers in Nineteenth-Century Scotland: Making and Adapting in an Industrial Age. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2022. pp. 1– 256. 14 figs. ISBN 9781474490307. Hbk £85
Anthony Lewis
Pages 1385-1386
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13208
Tirthankar Roy, Monsoon Economies: India's History in a Changing Climate. London: The MIT Press, 2022. pp. 230. ISBN 9780262543583. Pbk $30.00
James Fenske
Pages 1387-1388
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13204
Morten Jerven, The Wealth and Poverty of African States: Economic Growth, Living Standards and Taxation since the Late Nineteenth Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. pp. 198. ISBN 9781108341080. Pbk £19.99
Leandro Prados De La Escosura
Pages 1388-1390
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13205
Tirthankar Roy and Anand V. Swamy, Law and the Economy in a Young Democracy. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2022. pp. 272. 14 tables. 4 figs. ISBN 9780226799001. Hbk $45.00
Maanik Nath
Pages 1390-1391
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13207
CORRIGENDUM
Correction to ‘Cotton cultivation under colonial rule in India in the nineteenth century from a comparative perspective’
Pages 1392-1392
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/ehr.13216
