Peer and cohort effects are important in health economics, and obesity may be related to social relationships, where obese individuals interact with other obese individuals. There were significant 19th century cohort effects, where BMIs were related to the cohort that an individual belonged....

The use of height data to measure living standards is now a well-established method in economic history. Moreover, a number of core findings in the literature are widely agreed upon. There are still some populations, places, and times, however, for which anthropometric evidence remains thin. One...

By using a new source of 19th century Texas state prison records, the present study contrasts the biological living conditions of comparable blacks and whites in the American South between the Civil War and Reconstruction. White stature exceeded black stature. Between 1850 and 1870, black...