IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/luekhi/0142.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Inequality and the working class in Scandinavia 1800 to 1910 - Workers' share of growing income

Author

Listed:
  • Bengtsson, Erik

    (Department of Economic History, Lund University)

Abstract

One of the major ways in which economic inequality can increase is when the development of wages of ordinary workers trail productivity and GDP growth, meaning that the increasing riches fall in the hand of other social groups (top employees, owners of land and capital). This paper investigates the relationship between wages and GDP in Denmark, Norway and Sweden from 1800 to 1910, using wage series for workers in agriculture as well as crafts and industry. It shows wages trailing especially in Norway from 1840 to the mid-1870s but also in Denmark in the 1850s and 1860s. On the other hand, wages generally increase faster than GDP in the 1880s and 1890s. These developments are explained with labour supply (population growth, migration) as well as class conflict and social policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Bengtsson, Erik, 2016. "Inequality and the working class in Scandinavia 1800 to 1910 - Workers' share of growing income," Lund Papers in Economic History 142, Lund University, Department of Economic History.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:luekhi:0142
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://lup.lub.lu.se/luur/download?func=downloadFile&recordOId=8514798&fileOId=8514799
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. O'Rourke, Kevin & Williamson, Jeffrey G., 1994. "Late Nineteenth-Century Anglo-American Factor-Price Convergence: Were Heckscher and Ohlin Right?," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 54(4), pages 892-916, December.
    2. Hanes, Christopher, 1993. "The Development of Nominal Wage Rigidity in the Late 19th Century," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 83(4), pages 732-756, September.
    3. Bengtsson, Erik & Waldenström, Daniel, 2018. "Capital Shares and Income Inequality: Evidence from the Long Run," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 78(3), pages 712-743, September.
    4. Hatton, T.J. & Williamson, J.G., 1992. "What Drove the Mass Migrations from Europe in the Late Ninteenth Century," Harvard Institute of Economic Research Working Papers 1614, Harvard - Institute of Economic Research.
    5. Berger, Helge & Spoerer, Mark, 2001. "Economic Crises And The European Revolutions Of 1848," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 61(2), pages 293-326, June.
    6. Svante Prado, 2010. "Fallacious convergence? Williamson’s real wage comparisons under scrutiny," Cliometrica, Journal of Historical Economics and Econometric History, Association Française de Cliométrie (AFC), vol. 4(2), pages 171-205, June.
    7. Erik Bengtsson, 2014. "Labour's share in twentieth-century Sweden: a reinterpretation," Scandinavian Economic History Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 62(3), pages 290-314, November.
    8. Kevin O’Rourke & Ahmed Rahman & Alan Taylor, 2013. "Luddites, the industrial revolution, and the demographic transition," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 373-409, December.
    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. Roberto Iacono & Elisa Palagi, 2020. "Still the lands of equality? On the heterogeneity of individual factor income shares in the Nordics," LEM Papers Series 2020/13, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.
    2. Baffigi, Alberto & Bontempi, Maria Elena & Felice, Emanuele & Golinelli, Roberto, 2015. "The changing relationship between inflation and the economic cycle in Italy: 1861–2012," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 53-70.
    3. Bengtsson, Erik & Prado, Svante, 2019. "The rise of the middle class: The income gap between salaried employees and workers in Sweden, 1830-1935," Lund Papers in Economic History 186, Lund University, Department of Economic History.
    4. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1umfa09lat1n0o44 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Kevin H. O’Rourke & Ahmed S. Rahman & Alan M. Taylor, 2012. "Trade, Technology and the Great Divergence," Departmental Working Papers 35, United States Naval Academy Department of Economics.
    6. David Khoudour-Casteras, 2005. "Migrations internationales, régimes de change et politiques sociales : un nouveau trilemme de politique économique ?," Sciences Po publications info:hdl:2441/f4rshpf3v1u, Sciences Po.
    7. Giacomo Gabbuti, 2018. "Labour Shares and Income Inequality: Insights from Italian Economic History, 1895-2015," HHB Working Papers Series 13, The Historical Household Budgets Project.
    8. D., Ivan, 2017. "Stability of the labour shares: evidence from OECD economies," MPRA Paper 79822, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Rabah Arezki & Markus Brückner, 2011. "Food prices and political instability," NCID Working Papers 01/2011, Navarra Center for International Development, University of Navarra.
    10. Markus Brückner & Antonio Ciccone, 2011. "Rain and the Democratic Window of Opportunity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(3), pages 923-947, May.
    11. Matthew Fisher-Post, 2020. "Factor Shares in the long run," World Inequality Lab Working Papers hal-02876978, HAL.
    12. Dimitris Mavridis & Pálma Mosberger, 2017. "Income Inequality and Incentives. The Quasi-Natural Experiment of Hungary 1914-2008," World Inequality Lab Working Papers halshs-02797438, HAL.
    13. Mario J. Crucini & Gregor W. Smith, 2016. "Distance and Time Effects in Swedish Commodity Prices, 1732–1914," NBER Working Papers 22175, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Bartels, Charlotte, 2019. "Top Incomes in Germany, 1871-2014," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 669-707.
    15. Sascha Becker & Francesco Cinnirella & Ludger Woessmann, 2010. "The trade-off between fertility and education: evidence from before the demographic transition," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 15(3), pages 177-204, September.
    16. Timothy J. Hatton & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2009. "Vanishing Third World Emigrants?," NBER Working Papers 14785, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Marta de la Cuesta-González & Cristina Ruza & José M. Rodríguez-Fernández, 2020. "Rethinking the Income Inequality and Financial Development Nexus. A Study of Nine OECD Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(13), pages 1-18, July.
    18. Dafermos, Yannis & Nikolaidi, Maria, 2022. "Assessing climate policies: an ecological stock–flow consistent perspective," Greenwich Papers in Political Economy 38039, University of Greenwich, Greenwich Political Economy Research Centre.
    19. Lennard, Jason, 2021. "Sticky wages and the Great Depression: Evidence from the United Kingdom," eabh Papers 21-01, The European Association for Banking and Financial History (EABH).
    20. Dimitris Mavridis & Pálma Mosberger, 2017. "Income Inequality and Incentives. The Quasi-Natural Experiment of Hungary 1914-2008," Working Papers halshs-02797438, HAL.
    21. Jacks, David S. & Meissner, Christopher M. & Novy, Dennis, 2010. "Trade costs in the first wave of globalization," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 47(2), pages 127-141, April.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Wages; living standards; inequality; working class; Denmark; Norway; Sweden;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • I30 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General
    • J30 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - General
    • N13 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: Pre-1913
    • N33 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy - - - Europe: Pre-1913

    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:hhs:luekhi:0142. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dhlunse.html .

    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: Tobias Karlsson or Benny Carlsson (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dhlunse.html .

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.