We estimate a long-run trend of Brazilian human capital that extends back to the very beginning of the eighteenth century. With new data on selective immigration during the era of mass migrations at the end of the nineteenth century, we show that human capital endowment of international migrants...

In this paper, we assess the inheritance of human capital in the early modern period with a comprehensive dataset covering eight countries in Europe and Latin America. We focus on the within-household process of human capital formation. Gregory Clark suggested that the wealthy and...

This paper draws on a unique data set, hojok (household registers), to estimate numeracy levels in Korea, 1550-1630, and evidence on Japan and China from the early modern period until 1800. We found that a substantial share of East Asians rounded their ages to multiples of five. However, the...

In this study we examine anthropometric data for eight countries in the Middle East for the period 1850-1910, and we follow those countries until the 1980s. The Middle East had a relatively good position during the mid-19th century, if human stature or real wages are considered, but much less so...

Land per capita was one important determinant of height in the Malthusian world 0 to 1800 A.D. A second factor was specialization in milk cattle agriculture. It had two positive effects on human stature: first, proximity to protein production resulted in a very low local shadow price of milk, as...