Traditional explanations for Western Europe's demographic growth in the High Middle Ages are unable to explain the rise in per-capita income that accompanied observed population changes. Here, we examine the hypothesis that an innovation in information technology changed the optimal structure of...

Evidence of falling wages in Catholic cities and rising wages in Protestant cities between 1500 and 1750, during the spread of literacy in the vernacular, is inconsistent with most theoretical models of economic growth. In The Protestant Ethic, Weber suggested an alternative explanation based on...