Why did the West grow so rapidly over the last 500 years, while much of therest of the world stagnated? And why several countries, especially in East Asia, grown so fast over the last half-century? If we can understand these growth experiences, and identify the forces which made them possible,...

Cheryl Schonhardt-Bailey's excellent The Rise of Free Trade (RFT) gathers together speeches, contemporary writing and extracts from parliamentary debates relating to British trade policy between 1815 and 1906 (the year in which free trade was consolidated by a decisice General Election victory...

A simple look at nominal or effective tariff rates is not sufficient to analyse the trade policy. One has to consider the overall effects of protection, and by definition this requires a general equilibrium approach. The present paper aims to fill this gap in the literature. It makes use of a...

This paper tries to be the first step in a systematic comparison of economic growth in Denmark and Ireland between 1870 and 1939. Section 2 ofthis paper sets the scene by discussing broader trends of living standards and agricultural productivity. Section 3 outlines the developments in the...

This is a paper about intercontinental trade, since factor proportions differ far more between continents than within. Long distance intercontinental trade was also the economic event which motivated the theoretical work of Bertil Ohlin.

This paper examines the relationship between maternal employment, childcare during infancy and the overweight status of pre-school children. Using data from the Infant Cohort of the Growing-Up in Ireland Survey, propensity score matching addresses the issue of potential selection bias, quantile...

This paper analyses procurement from two, risk-averse, suppliers who are responsible for the timely delivery of some inputs. Their production is subject to inherent disruptions. We characterize the optimal contracts when suppliers can invest to lower the risk of delays that are costly to the...

We investigate whether acquiring more education when young has long-term effects on risktaking behavior in financial markets and whether the effects spill over to spouses and children. There is substantial evidence that more educated people are more likely to invest in the stock market. However,...