It is widely hypothesized that incomes in wealthy countries are insulated from environmental conditions because individuals have the resources needed to adapt to their environment. We test this idea in the wealthiest economy in human history. Using within-county variation in weather, we estimate...

This paper offers a thesis as to why the US overtook the UK and other European countries in the 20th century in both aggregate and per-capita GDP, as a case study of recent models of endogenous growth where human capital is the "engine of growth". The conjecture is that the ascendancy of the US...

Over the last 50 years, there has been a remarkable convergence in the occupational distribution between white men, women, and blacks. We measure the macroeconomic consequences of this convergence through the prism of a Roy model of occupational choice in which women and blacks face frictions in...

This paper explores the link between trade structure, trade specialization and per capita incomegrowth. It is argued that industrial upgrading in export specialization patterns has a positive long-rungrowth effect, while the effect of structural change in industrial import patterns is in...

Worldwide, dependency ratios are forecast to increase dramatically in the next 50 years. A great deal of attention has been devoted to understanding the changes in fiscal policies that must' take place to accommodate these changes. In contrast, less effort has been concentrated on studying the...

Individuals differ in both inherited and acquired abilities, but only the latter differ among countries and time periods. Human capital analysis deals with acquired capabilities which are developed through formal and informal education at school and at home, and through training, experience, and...