We present new findings about the relationship between marriage and socioeconomic background in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Imputing socioeconomic status of family of origin from first names, we document a socioeconomic gradient for women in the probability of...

This study provides an estimation of the causal relationship between the reduction in malaria transmission and farmer agricultural productivity. Exploiting exogenous geographic variations in the stability of malaria and using historical disaggregated county data for the US together with a robust...

We present new findings about the relationship between marriage and socioeconomic background in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Imputing socioeconomic status of family of origin from first names, we document a socioeconomic gradient for women in the probability of...

Fertility is a main driver and outcome of long-term growth. Yet, fertility may not only interact with the level of income but also with its volatility. In pre-modern economies where formal social security was largely absent, fertility decisions may also have been made in view of insuring income...

I analyze whether variation in rainfall risk played a role for the speed of the demographic transition among American settlers. The underlying hypothesis is that children constituted a buffer stock of labor that could be mobilized in response to income shocks. Identification relies on fertility...

This paper examines the effect of waterborne lead exposure on infant mortality in American cities over the period 1900 to 1920. Variation across cities in water acidity and the types of service pipes, which together determined the extent of lead exposure, identifies the effects of lead on infant...

The Protestant ethic has been depicted as declining in America between 1870 and 1930, due to new affordable consumer durables and less rewarding industrial work. This article re-examines this period and finds that the Protestant ethic did not so much decline as become transformed. The work ethic...

Algan and Cahuc in "Inherited Trust and Growth" (AER, 2010) argue that "inherited trust" is a key factor in explaining growth rates across countries. They derive a measure of inherited trust by linking respondents' "home countries" in the United States General Social Survey (1972-2004) and the...

Using historical census and survey data, Long and Ferrie (2013) found a significant decline in social mobility in the United States from 1880 to 1973. We present two critiques of the Long-Ferrie study. First, the data quality of the Long-Ferrie study is more limiting than the authors...

The US tolerates more inequality than Europe and believes its economic mobility is greater than Europe?s, though they had roughly equal rates of intergenerational occupational mobility in the late twentieth century. We extend this comparison into the nineteenth century using 10,000...