Doctoral Dissertation Research in Economics: Was the Black Death a Watershed? Measuring European Regional Inequality in the Very Long Run

经济学博士论文研究：黑死病是一个分水岭吗？

• 批准号: 1757231
• 负责人: Nico Voigtlaender
• 金额: $ 2.21万
• 依托单位: National Bureau of Economic Research Inc
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2018-04-01 至 2020-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1757231&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Economics; Was

This research investigates the roots of modern economic growth and regional inequality which can be traced back to the Industrial Revolution and the preceding period. In particular, the investigator focuses on the divergence in incomes per capita within Europe before the Industrial Revolution. Economic historians have recently suggested several competing explanations for this divergence, but many of these explanations are rooted in the events that took place around the time or in the aftermath of the Black Death (1347-1350). Therefore, this research constructs new measures of economic activity starting from 1300 in order to explore the factors that contributed to sustained economic growth in Northwestern Europe but hindered it elsewhere. The investigator utilizes a unique data source -- revenues of the Catholic Church -- to study how various regions responded to the Black Death. Given the limitations of the existing data, it remains unclear whether, and via which channels, the massive population losses during the Black Death can be linked to the divergent growth paths of European economies after 1500. The resulting database will illuminate some of the long-standing questions in economic growth and also improve our understanding of pre-modern society.In the recent years, economic historians have suggested several competing explanations for the divergence in the incomes per capita between Europe and Asia, as well as within Europe, before the Industrial Revolution. Many of these explanations are rooted in the events that took place around the time or in the aftermath of the Black Death. With the exception of a handful of countries, however, the existing data on incomes in the late Middle Ages is fragmented and ill-suited for testing these hypotheses. This research uses data on revenues of the Catholic Church, which were collected as the taxes on clergy, to measure the dynamics of regional inequality in Europe in a more direct fashion. The Catholic Church was a uniquely cohesive and capable institution that used advanced bookkeeping methods, routinely updated registries of its personnel, and transferred vast amounts of wealth all over Europe. Besides its geographic scope, the assembled panel-like database has the following advantages: (i) Church revenues are available at annual intervals right before, during the course of, and immediately after the Black Death; (ii) the primary spatial unit is diocese, which allows the researcher to study subnational variation in income levels; (iii) at a given point in time, most transactions were made in the same currency.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

本研究旨在探讨现代经济增长和地区不平等的根源，这些根源可以追溯到工业革命及其之前的时期。特别是，研究人员重点关注工业革命前欧洲人均收入的差异。经济史学家最近对这种分歧提出了几种相互矛盾的解释，但其中许多解释都植根于黑死病（1347-1350）前后发生的事件。因此，本研究从1300年开始构建新的经济活动衡量标准，以探索促进西北欧持续经济增长但阻碍其他地区经济增长的因素。研究人员利用一个独特的数据源--天主教会的收入--来研究各个地区对黑死病的反应。鉴于现有数据的局限性，目前尚不清楚黑死病期间的大规模人口损失是否以及通过哪些渠道与1500年后欧洲经济体的不同增长路径有关。由此产生的数据库将阐明经济增长中一些长期存在的问题，也将增进我们对前现代社会的理解。近年来，经济历史学家对工业革命前欧洲和亚洲以及欧洲内部的人均收入差异提出了几种相互矛盾的解释。这些解释中的许多都植根于黑死病发生前后或之后发生的事件。然而，除了少数几个国家之外，关于中世纪晚期收入的现有数据是零散的，不适合检验这些假设。这项研究使用了天主教会的收入数据，这些数据是作为神职人员的税收收集的，以更直接的方式衡量欧洲地区不平等的动态。天主教会是一个独特的有凝聚力和能力的机构，它使用先进的簿记方法，定期更新其人员的登记册，并将大量财富转移到整个欧洲。除了其地理范围外，组合面板式数据库具有以下优点：（i）教会收入可在黑死病之前，期间和之后立即提供年度间隔;（ii）主要空间单位是教区，这使研究人员能够研究收入水平的次国家变化;（iii）在某一特定时间点，大多数交易都是以同一种货币进行的。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。