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作者：Trinity College Dublin
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作者：George Mason University
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作者：University of Oxford; University of Oxford; Bocconi University; Bocconi University; University of Oxford
摘要：This article introduces the Americas in the Great Divergence debate by measuring real wages in various North and South American cities between colonization and independence, and comparing them to Europe and Asia. We find that for much of the period, North America was the most prosperous region of the world, while Latin America was much poorer. We then discuss a series of hypotheses that can explain these results, including migration, the demography of the American Indian populations, and the v...
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作者：University of Reading
摘要：We examine the strategies interwar working-class British households used to smooth consumption over time and guard against negative contingencies such as illness, unemployment, and death. Newly discovered returns from the U.K. Ministry of Labour's 1937/38 Household Expenditure Survey are used to fully categorize expenditure smoothing via nineteen credit/savings vehicles. We find that households made extensive use of expenditure-smoothing devices. Families' reliance on expenditure-smoothing is ...
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作者：Pennsylvania Commonwealth System of Higher Education (PCSHE); University of Pittsburgh
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作者：Rutgers University System; Rutgers University New Brunswick; University System of Ohio; Miami University; National Bureau of Economic Research
摘要：Enacted in 1922 and repealed in 1929, the Sheppard-Towner program gave federal matching money to states to provide public health education to mothers. We examine variation in state participation in the program, and find that the timing of women's suffrage had an important impact. However, we find that the effect of suffrage was short-lived and did not influence public health spending after the program's repeal. We also find no evidence of a demonstration effect. On average, the states that con...
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作者：European University Institute
摘要：The extension of social insurance during the twentieth century did not translate into homogeneous pension provision. Using a new database, this article analyzes the evolution of pensions in the long run for a sample of welfare states. The convergence in old age benefits as a share of earnings is only found for all earnings levels between 1970 and 1990. The results also underline the role as determinants of pension policy of both domestic and external factors. In line with previous literature, ...
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作者：Colorado College; University System of Georgia; University of Georgia
摘要：We examine the economic consequences of an 1886 reform in Massachusetts that mandated the weekly payment of wages. We derive conditions on key elasticities of labor supply that determine the qualitative effects of the reform on workers' effective wages and utility. We match census and administrative data on workers in a Lowell textile mill for a period encompassing the switch from monthly to weekly payment. Empirical estimates of a labor supply equation imply that the reform increased workers'...
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作者：University of London; London School Economics & Political Science
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作者：American University
摘要：The onset of the Great Depression did not spark a surge in personal bankruptcy. For debtors in default, state garnishment law played a significant role in the decision to file for bankruptcy. Only states that made it easy to garnish a debtor's wages experienced significant increases in bankruptcy as a consequence of the Depression.
