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Malthus in cointegration space: evidence of a post-Malthusian pre-industrial England

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Listed author(s):
  • Niels Møller

    ()

  • Paul Sharp

Abstract

This paper re-examines the interaction between population growth and income per capita in pre-industrial England. Our results suggest that, as early as two centuries preceding the Industrial Revolution, England had already escaped the Malthusian Epoch and entered a post-Malthusian regime, where income per capita continued to spur population growth but was no longer stagnant. Our formulation of a post-Malthusian hypothesis implies cointegration between vital rates (birth- and death rates) and income and builds explicitly on a simple model of Malthusian stagnation. We show that this hypothesis can be interpreted as an extension of the latter model where the negative Malthusian feedback effect from population on income, as implied by diminishing returns to labor, is offset by a positive Boserupian and/or Smithian scale effect of population on technology. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

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File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10887-013-9094-0
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Article provided by Springer in its journal Journal of Economic Growth.

Volume (Year): 19 (2014)
Issue (Month): 1 (March)
Pages: 105-140

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Handle: RePEc:kap:jecgro:v:19:y:2014:i:1:p:105-140
DOI: 10.1007/s10887-013-9094-0
Contact details of provider: Web page: http://www.springer.com

Order Information: Web: http://www.springer.com/economics/growth/journal/10887/PS2

Keywords: Cointegration; Malthus; Post-Malthusian regime; Pre-industrial England; Structural model; Unified growth theory;

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  1. Gregory Clark, 2005. "The Condition of the Working Class in England, 1209-2004," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(6), pages 1307-1340, December.
  2. Johansen, Soren, 1992. "Testing weak exogeneity and the order of cointegration in UK money demand data," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 313-334, June.
  3. Ashraf, Quamrul & Galor, Oded, 2008. "Dynamics and Stagnation in the Malthusian Epoch: Theory and Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 7057, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  4. Shekhar Aiyar & Carl-Johan Dalgaard & Omer Moav, 2008. "Technological progress and regress in pre-industrial times," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 125-144, June.
  5. Michael Kremer, 1993. "Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 108(3), pages 681-716.
  6. Granger, C. W. J., 1981. "Some properties of time series data and their use in econometric model specification," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 121-130, May.
  7. Jurgen A. Doornik & David F. Hendry & Bent Nielsen, 1998. "Inference in Cointegrating Models: UK M1 Revisited," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(5), pages 533-572, December.
  8. Ronald Lee, 1973. "Population in Preindustrial England: An Econometric Analysis," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 87(4), pages 581-607.
  9. Doornik, Jurgen A, 1998. " Approximations to the Asymptotic Distributions of Cointegration Tests," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(5), pages 573-593, December.
  10. Allen, Robert C., 2001. "The Great Divergence in European Wages and Prices from the Middle Ages to the First World War," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 38(4), pages 411-447, October.
  11. Michael Anderson & Ronald Lee, 2002. "Malthus in state space: Macro economic-demographic relations in English history, 1540 to 1870," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 15(2), pages 195-220.
  12. David N. Weil & Oded Galor, 2000. "Population, Technology, and Growth: From Malthusian Stagnation to the Demographic Transition and Beyond," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 806-828, September.
  13. Nicolini, Esteban A., 2007. "Was Malthus right? A VAR analysis of economic and demographic interactions in pre-industrial England," European Review of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(01), pages 99-121, April.
  14. David Collard, 2001. "Malthus, Population, and the Generational Bargain," History of Political Economy, Duke University Press, vol. 33(4), pages 697-716, Winter.
  15. Møller, Niels Framroze, 2008. "Bridging Economic Theory Models and the Cointegrated Vector Autoregressive Model," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW), vol. 2, pages 1-29.
  16. Crafts, Nicholas & Mills, Terence C., 2009. "From Malthus to Solow: How did the Malthusian economy really evolve?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 68-93, March.
  17. Heino Bohn Nielsen, 2004. "Cointegration analysis in the presence of outliers," Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 7(1), pages 249-271, 06.
  18. Quamrul Ashraf & Oded Galor, 2011. "Dynamics and Stagnation in the Malthusian Epoch," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 2003-2041, August.
  19. Lee, Maw Lin & Loschky, David, 1987. "Malthusian Population Oscillations," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 97(387), pages 727-739, September.
  20. Soren Johansen, 2002. "A Small Sample Correction for the Test of Cointegrating Rank in the Vector Autoregressive Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(5), pages 1929-1961, September.
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Cited by:

  1. Marc Patrick Brag Klemp & Niels Framroze Møller, 2013. "Post-Malthusian Dynamics in Pre-Industrial Scandinavia," Working Papers 2013-14, Brown University, Department of Economics.
  2. Ho, Chi Pui, 2016. "Industrious Selection: Explaining Five Revolutions and Two Divergences in Eurasian Economic History within a Unified Growth Framework," MPRA Paper 73862, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  3. Møller, Niels Framroze, 2015. "Energy Demand, Substitution and a Potential for Electrification: An econometric analysis of eight Danish subsectors," MPRA Paper 69931, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  4. Bruno Chiarini & Elisabetta Marzano, 2014. "Urbanization and Growth: Why Did the Splendor of the Italian Cities in the Sixteenth Century not Lead to Transition?," CESifo Working Paper Series 5038, CESifo Group Munich.
  5. repec:spr:cliomt:v:11:y:2017:i:2:d:10.1007_s11698-016-0144-7 is not listed on IDEAS
  6. Groth, Christian & Persson, Karl Gunnar, 2016. "Growth or stagnation in pre-industrial Britain? A revealed income growth approach," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 264, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
  7. Niels Framroze Møller, 2013. "Understanding Unemployment Hysteresis: A system-based econometric approach to changing equilibria and slow adjustment," Discussion Papers 13-06, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics.
  8. Nina Boberg-Fazlic & Paul Sharp, 2013. "Does Welfare Spending Crowd Out Charitable Activity? Evidence from Historical England under the Poor Laws," Working Papers 0049, European Historical Economics Society (EHES).

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