This paper first explores the history of famine in England as a window on living standards in the medieval and pre-industrial eras. It then considers nutrition levels and human capital endowments in England in the eve of the Industrial Revolution.

Emigrants from Italy and Ireland contributed disproportionately to the Age of Mass Migration. That their departure improved the living standards of those they left behind is hardly in doubt. Nevertheless, a voluminous literature on the selectivity of migrant flows - both from sending and...