We study the importance of childhood socioeconomic conditions in explaining differences inlife expectancy using data from a sample of around 5,000 children collected in the UK in1937-39, who have been traced through official death records up to 2005. We estimate anumber of duration of life...

This paper provides an overview of asylum migration from poor strife-prone countries to the OECD since the 1950s. I examine the political and economic factors in source countries that generate refugees and asylum seekers. Particular attention is given to the rising trend of asylum applications...

In this paper we argue that the fertility decline that began around 1880 had substantial positive effects on the health of children, as the quality-quantity trade-off would suggest. We use microdata from a unique survey from 1930s Britain to analyze the relationship between the standardized...

We study the importance of childhood socioeconomic conditions in explaining differences in life expectancy using data from a sample of around 5,000 children collected in the UK in 1937-39, who have been traced through official death records up to 2005. We estimate a number of duration of life...

There is growing interest among economists in public opinion towards immigration, something that is often seen as the foundation for restrictive immigration policies. Existing studies have focused on the responses to survey questions on whether the individual would prefer more or less...

Atmospheric pollution was an important side effect of coal-fired industrialisation in the nineteenth century. In Britain emissions of black smoke were on the order of fifty times as high as they were a century later. In this paper we examine the effects of these emissions on child development by...

It is widely believed that the current recession has soured public attitudes towards immigration. But most existing studies are cross sectional and can shed little light on the economy-wide forces that shift public opinion on immigration. In this paper I use the six rounds of the European Social...

We examine the health and height of men born in England and Wales in the 1890s who enlisted in the army at the time of the First World War. We take a sample of the army service records and use this information to find the recruits as children in the 1901 census. Econometric results indicate that...

Historical experience suggests that when a period of rising immigration is followed by a sudden slump, this can trigger a policy backlash. This has not occurred in the current recession. This paper examines three links in the chain between the slump and immigration policy. First, although...

This is a survey of some of the key studies in the literature on international migration in history that may be described as cliometric. This literature uses the concepts and approaches of applied economics to investigate a range of historical issues and there are strong parallels with the...