Demographic Transition and Industrial Revolution: A Macroeconomic Investigation

All industrialized countries have experienced a transition from high birth rates, land-based production and stagnant standards of living to low birth rates and sustained income growth. To develop a better understanding of these economic and demographic transformations and the link between them, we construct a general equilibrium framework merging the Hansen and Prescott (2002) model of structural change with the Barro and Becker (1989) model of fertility choice. We find that when the historical changes of youth mortality and sector-specific productivity are introduced into the model, parameterized to capture key moments of 17th century England, it does remarkably well at generating the long-run features of economic and demographic development of England. (Copyright: Elsevier)