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Made for Toil: Natural selection at the dawn of agriculture

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Author Info
Jacob L. Weisdorf

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Abstract

The labour input among pre-historic foragers was normally rewarded within the same day of the effort. For the first farmers, by contrast, labour input and its rewards could be far apart. However, the patience was worthwhile: population growth rates among early agriculturalists were up to 60 times higher than those of their foraging counterparts. It is well-known from the biological science that humans differ with respect to metabolism. This study argues that rates of metabolism well-suited for the many hours of labour input required for farming gained an evolutionary advantage with the advent of agriculture. This theory helps shedding light on the puzzles why farming was adopted despite its high labour costs, and why people of agricultural societies work more than their foraging counterparts.

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Paper provided by PSE (Ecole normale supérieure) in its series PSE Working Papers with number 2007-33.

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Date of creation: 2007
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Handle: RePEc:pse:psecon:2007-33

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  1. Smith, Vernon L, 1975. "The Primitive Hunter Culture, Pleistocene Extinction, and the Rise of Agriculture," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 83(4), pages 727-55, August. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2002. "Natural Selection And The Origin Of Economic Growth," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 117(4), pages 1133-1191, November. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Arthur Robson & Hillard Kaplan, 2006. "Viewpoint: The economics of hunter-gatherer societies and the evolution of human characteristics," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 39(2), pages 375-398, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Nicolas Marceau & Gordon Myers, 2005. "On the Early Holocene: Foraging to Early Agriculture," Cahiers de recherche 0502, CIRPEE. [Downloadable!]
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  5. Jacob L. Weisdorf, 2005. "From Foraging To Farming: Explaining The Neolithic Revolution," Journal of Economic Surveys, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 19(4), pages 561-586, 09. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Clark, Gregory & Hamilton, Gillian, 2006. "Survival of the Richest: The Malthusian Mechanism in Pre-Industrial England," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 66(03), pages 707-736, September. [Downloadable!]
  7. Olsson, Ola & Hibbs, Douglas Jr., 2005. "Biogeography and long-run economic development," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 909-938, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  8. Arthur J. Robson & Hillard S. Kaplan, 2003. "The Evolution of Human Life Expectancy and Intelligence in Hunter-Gatherer Economies," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 150-169, March. [Downloadable!]
  9. Oded Galor & Omer Moav, 2007. "The Neolithic Revolution and Contemporary Variations in Life Expectancy," Working Papers 2007-14, Brown University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
  10. Hansson, Ingemar & Stuart, Charles, 1990. "Malthusian Selection of Preferences," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(3), pages 529-44, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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