IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hes/wpaper/0236.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Freedom in Retrospect

Author

Listed:
  • Leandro Prados de la Escosura

    (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid)

Abstract

This paper analyses economic freedom for a sample of 21 OECD countries over the past 170 years on the basis of a new thoroughly revised Historical Index of Economic Liberty (HIEL). Long-term gains in economic freedom reached two-thirds of its potential maximum. The expansion of economic freedom was abruptly interrupted by the world wars and resumed after 1950, to peak in 2000 and stagnate thereafter. International openness has been its main contributing dimension, especially after 1950. Stability in the country ranking coexisted with a narrowing of the distance between countries’ levels of economic freedom.

Suggested Citation

  • Leandro Prados de la Escosura, 2023. "Economic Freedom in Retrospect," Working Papers 0236, European Historical Economics Society (EHES).
    • Handle: RePEc:hes:wpaper:0236
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ehes.org/wp/EHES_236.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Vincent Geloso, 2019. "A price index for Canada, 1688 to 1850," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(2), pages 526-560, May.
    2. Leandro Prados De La Escosura, 2016. "Economic freedom in the long run: evidence from OECD countries (1850–2007)," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 69(2), pages 435-468, May.
    3. Dennis P. Quinn & A. Maria Toyoda, 2008. "Does Capital Account Liberalization Lead to Growth?," The Review of Financial Studies, Society for Financial Studies, vol. 21(3), pages 1403-1449, May.
    4. Clague, Christopher & Keefer, Philip & Knack, Stephen & Olson, Mancur, 1999. "Contract-Intensive Money: Contract Enforcement, Property Rights, and Economic Performance," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 4(2), pages 185-211, June.
    5. Burhop, Carsten & Wolff, Guntram B., 2005. "A Compromise Estimate of German Net National Product, 1851–1913, and its Implications for Growth and Business Cycles," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 65(3), pages 613-657, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leandro Prados De La Escosura, 2016. "Economic freedom in the long run: evidence from OECD countries (1850–2007)," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 69(2), pages 435-468, May.
    2. Joan R Rosés & Nikolaus Wolf, 2021. "Regional growth and inequality in the long-run: Europe, 1900–2015," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 37(1), pages 17-48.
    3. Yuan, Li & Rao, Siqi & Yang, Shenggang & Dai, Pengyi, 2023. "Does equity market openness increase productivity? the dual effects of Shanghai-Hong Kong stock Connect program in China," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    4. Hartwell, Christopher A., 2014. "The impact of institutional volatility on financial volatility in transition economies : a GARCH family approach," BOFIT Discussion Papers 6/2014, Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition.
    5. Knack, Steve & Xu, Lixin Colin, 2017. "Unbundling institutions for external finance: Worldwide firm-level evidence," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 215-232.
    6. Christopher Hartwell, 2022. "Institutions and trade‐related inequality," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(3), pages 3246-3264, July.
    7. Larrain, Borja, 2011. "World betas, consumption growth, and financial integration," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 999-1018, October.
    8. Naudé, Wim & Nagler, Paula, 2022. "The Ossified Economy: The Case of Germany, 1870-2020," IZA Discussion Papers 15607, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Rok Spruk & Mitja Kovac, 2018. "Inefficient Growth," Review of Economics and Institutions, Università di Perugia, vol. 9(2).
    10. Cezar, Rafael & Monnet, Eric, 2023. "Capital controls and foreign reserves against external shocks: Combined or alone?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    11. Casson, Mark C. & Della Giusta, Marina & Kambhampati, Uma S., 2010. "Formal and Informal Institutions and Development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 137-141, February.
    12. Abayomi Toyin Onanuga Olaronke Toyin Onanuga, 2016. "Do Financial and Trade Openness Lead to Financial Sector Development in Nigeria?," Zagreb International Review of Economics and Business, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zagreb, vol. 19(2), pages 57-68, November.
    13. Donadelli, M. & Gufler, I. & Paradiso, A., 2024. "Financial market integration: A complex and controversial journey," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    14. Philip Keefer & Christopher Kilby, 2021. "Introduction to the special issue: In memoriam Stephen Knack," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 16(3), pages 473-493, July.
    15. Ostry, Jonathan D. & Ghosh, Atish R. & Chamon, Marcos & Qureshi, Mahvash S., 2012. "Tools for managing financial-stability risks from capital inflows," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 407-421.
    16. Sebnem Kalemli-Ozcan & Elias Papaioannou & José-Luis Peydró, 2013. "Financial Regulation, Financial Globalization, and the Synchronization of Economic Activity," Journal of Finance, American Finance Association, vol. 68(3), pages 1179-1228, June.
    17. Philipp Heimberger, 2022. "Does economic globalisation promote economic growth? A meta‐analysis," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 45(6), pages 1690-1712, June.
    18. Chowdhry, Bhagwan & Roll, Richard & Saxena, Konark, 2013. "Development and freedom as risk management," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 103-109.
    19. Oguzhan Dincer & Christopher Ellis, 2005. "Predation, Protection, and Accumulation: Endogenous Property Rights in an Overlapping Generations Growth Model," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 12(4), pages 435-455, August.
    20. Ryan H. Murphy & Colin O’Reilly, 2023. "Freedom through taxation: the effect of fiscal capacity on the rule of law," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 69-90, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Economic Freedom; Property Rights; Price Stability; Openness; Regulation; OECD;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • N40 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • O24 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - Trade Policy; Factor Movement; Foreign Exchange Policy
    • N40 - Economic History - - Government, War, Law, International Relations, and Regulation - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • P14 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Property Rights

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hes:wpaper:0236. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Paul Sharp (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ehessea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.