IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/zbw/vfsc15/112909.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Biological Standard of Living in Zurich during WWI

Author

Listed:
  • Floris, Joël
  • Müller, Consuela
  • Woitek, Ulrich

Abstract

The paper analyzes the class specific biological standard of living in the city of Zurich during World War I. We find an increase of aver- age human stature for lower class conscripts born during this period, while the average height of conscripts from the upper and middle class stagnated or even decreased, despite the lack of change in the income differential. A potential explanation of this phenomenon could be the changes in access to food and consumption habits, affecting terminal height via changes in milk consumption.

Suggested Citation

  • Floris, Joël & Müller, Consuela & Woitek, Ulrich, 2015. "The Biological Standard of Living in Zurich during WWI," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 112909, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:vfsc15:112909
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/112909/1/VfS_2015_pid_509.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Williamson Jeffrey G., 1995. "The Evolution of Global Labor Markets since 1830: Background Evidence and Hypotheses," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 32(2), pages 141-196, April.
    2. Ian Gazeley & Andrew Newell, 2013. "The First World War and working-class food consumption in Britain," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 17(1), pages 71-94, February.
    3. Baten, Joerg, 2009. "Protein supply and nutritional status in nineteenth century Bavaria, Prussia and France," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 165-180, July.
    4. Steckel, Richard H., 2009. "Heights and human welfare: Recent developments and new directions," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 1-23, January.
    5. Richard H. Steckel, 1995. "Stature and the Standard of Living," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 33(4), pages 1903-1940, 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. Antonio M. Linares-Luján & Francisco M. Parejo-Moruno, 2021. "Rural Height Penalty or Socioeconomic Penalization? The Nutritional Inequality in Backward Spain," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(9), pages 1-25, April.
    2. Bailey, Roy E. & Hatton, Timothy J. & Inwood, Kris, 2014. "Health, Height and the Household at the Turn of the 20th Century," IZA Discussion Papers 8128, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Tassenaar, Vincent, 2019. "Development of regional variety of the biological standard of living in the Netherlands, 1812–1913," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 151-161.
    4. Olivier Bargain & Jinan Zeidan, 2017. "Stature, Skills and Adult Life Outcomes: Evidence from Indonesia," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 53(6), pages 873-890, June.
    5. Maria-Dolores, Ramon & Martínez Carrion, José Miguel, 2012. "The comovement between height and some economic development indicators in Spain," UMUFAE Economics Working Papers 26464, DIGITUM. Universidad de Murcia.
    6. Elisabetta De Cao, 2015. "The Height Production Function from Birth to Age Two," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(3), pages 329-363.
    7. Komlos, John, 2012. "A Three-Decade “Kuhnian” History of the Antebellum Puzzle: Explaining the shrinking of the US population at the onset of modern economic growth," Discussion Papers in Economics 12758, University of Munich, Department of Economics.
    8. Galofré-Vilà, Gregori, 2018. "Growth and maturity: A quantitative systematic review and network analysis in anthropometric history," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 28(C), pages 107-118.
    9. Meisel-Roca, Adolfo & Ramírez-Giraldo, María Teresa & Santos-Cárdenas, Daniela, 2019. "Long run relationship between biological well being, and economic development in Colombia," Working papers 24, Red Investigadores de Economía.
    10. Julianne Treme & Lee A. Craig, 2013. "Urbanization, Health And Human Stature," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 65, pages 130-141, May.
    11. Schultz, T. Paul, 2010. "Population and Health Policies," Handbook of Development Economics, in: Dani Rodrik & Mark Rosenzweig (ed.), Handbook of Development Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 4785-4881, Elsevier.
    12. Woitek, Ulrich, 2003. "Height cycles in the 18th and 19th centuries," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 1(2), pages 243-257, June.
    13. Kitae Sohn, 2015. "A World Record in the Improvement in Biological Standards of Living in Korea: Evidence from Age at Menarche," CEH Discussion Papers 037, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    14. Chae, Minhee & Hatton, Timothy J. & Meng, Xin, 2023. "Explaining trends in adult height in China: 1950 to 1990," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    15. Timothy J. Hatton, 2015. "Stature and Sibship: Historical Evidence," CEH Discussion Papers 039, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    16. Schneider, Eric B., 2018. "Sample selection biases and the historical growth pattern of children," Economic History Working Papers 87075, London School of Economics and Political Science, Department of Economic History.
    17. Ward, W. Peter, 2013. "Stature, migration and human welfare in South China, 1850–1930," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 11(4), pages 488-501.
    18. Ramon Ramon-Muñoz & Josep-Maria Ramon-Muñoz & Begoña Candela-Martínez, 2021. "Sibship Size, Height and Cohort Selection: A Methodological Approach," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(24), pages 1-29, December.
    19. Sohn, Kitae, 2015. "The height premium in Indonesia," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 16(C), pages 1-15.
    20. Lee, Jinkook & Smith, James P., 2014. "Regional disparities in adult height, educational attainment, and late-life cognition: Findings from the Longitudinal Aging Study in India (LASI)," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 4(C), pages 26-34.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • N34 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy - - - Europe: 1913-
    • N94 - Economic History - - Regional and Urban History - - - Europe: 1913-
    • I30 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General

    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:zbw:vfsc15:112909. 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: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfsocea.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.