characteristics into two groups, those primarily important for agriculture and those primarily important for trade, we find that the … agriculture variables have relatively more explanatory power in countries that developed early and the trade variables have …

Developing countries pay substantially higher transportation costs than developed nations, which leads to less trade … a trade route. These characteristics explain more variation in shipping prices than do conventional proxies such as … distance, and significantly contribute to the higher shipping prices facing the developing world. Markups increase shipping …

the precipitous decline in nominal freight rates before the World War I, but it also extends the series to the 1940s …. Furthermore, our new series is linked to the post-World War II era (documented by David Hummels), so that we can be more precise …

ground for this question: freight rates fell on average by 50% while global trade increased 400% from 1870 to 1913. We … model. We also take the endogeneity of bilateral trade and freight rates seriously and propose an instrumental variables … late nineteenth century global trade boom. Rather, the most powerful forces driving the boom were those of income growth …

, population, trade and industry composition. Guided by the predictions of this model, we review the empirical literature on the …