We examine spatial convergence in biological well-being in the Habsburg Monarchy circa 1890-1910 on the basis of evidence on the physical stature of 21-year-old recruits disaggregated into 15 districts. We find that the shorter was the population in 1890 the faster its height grew thereafter....

The first known experiment with an exchange rate band took place in Austria- Hungary between 1896 and 1914. The rationale for introducing this policy rested on precisely those intuitions that the modern literature has emphasized: the band was designed to secure both exchange rate stability and...

We hypothesize that recent trends in U.S. and worldwide obesity are, in part, related to an increase in the marginal rate of time preference, where time preference refers to the rate at which people are willing to trade current benefit for future benefit. The higher the rate of time preference,...

We argue that with interdependent utility functions growth can lead to a decline in total welfare of a society if the gains from growth are sufficiently unequally distributed in the presence of negative externalities, i.e., envy.

We explore the efficiency of the forward reichsmark market in Vienna between 1876 and 1914. We estimate ARIMA models of the spot exchange rate in order to forecast the one-month-ahead spot rate. In turn we compare these forecasts to the contemporaneous forward rate, i.e., the market's forecast...

Researchers analyzing historical data on human stature have long sought an estimator that performs well in truncated-normal samples. This paper reviews that search, focusing on two currently widespread procedures: truncated least squares (TLS) and truncated maximum likelihood (TML). The first...

This paper describes a two-sector demo-economic model (agricultural and non-agricultural sectors) applied to Europe and spanning the period from the neolithic agricultural revolution to the Industrial Revolution. The model describes the "incessant contest" between population growth and food...

In his recent presidential address to the American Economic History Association, Paul Hohenberg argued that anthropometric history does not meet his criteria for useful research in the field of economic history. He considers research useful if (a) it "helps shape one of our underlying...

Aiming to further explore possible underlying causes for the recent stagnation in American heights, this paper describes the result of analysis of the commercial U.S. Sizing Survey. Using zip codes available in the data set, we consider geographic correlates of height such as local poverty rate,...