We use a novel data set spanning 1820-1910 to examine the origins of bank supervision and assess factors leading to the creation of formal bank supervisory institutions across U.S. states. We show that it took more than a century for the widespread adoption of independent supervisory...

There is a long-standing debate as to whether the Fisher effect operated during the classical gold standard period. We break new ground on this question by developing a market-based measure of inflation expectations during the gold standard. We derive a measure of silver-gold inflation...

We examine how the Banking Acts of the 1933 and 1935 and related New Deal legislation influenced risk taking in the financial sector of the U.S. economy. Our analysis focuses on contingent liability of bank owners for losses incurred by their firms and how the elimination of this liability...

We examine the first widespread use of capital controls in response to a global or regional financial crisis. In particular, we analyze whether capital controls mitigated capital flight in the 1930s and assess their causal effects on macroeconomic recovery from the Great Depression. We find...