This article examines the evolution of wealth inequality in Sweden from 1750 to 1900, contributing both to the debate on early modern and modern inequality and to the general debate on the pattern of inequality during industrialization. The pre‐industrial period (1750–1850) is for the first time examined for Sweden at the national level. The study uses a random sample of probate inventories from urban and rural areas across the country, adjusted for age and social class. Estimates are provided for the years 1750, 1800, 1850, and 1900. The results show a gradual growth in inequality as early as the mid‐eighteenth century, with the sharpest rise in the late nineteenth century. Whereas the early growth in inequality was connected to changes in the countryside and in agriculture, the later growth was related to industrialization encompassing both compositional effects and strong wealth accumulation among the richest. The level of inequality in Sweden in 1750 was lower than for other western European countries, but by 1900 Sweden was just as unequal.

This article aims to explain the location of the manufacturing industries in Italy in the period 1871-1911. The analytical framework takes into account of two competing theories on the determinants of the location of economic activity: the Heckscher-Ohlin (H-O) theory on factor endowments and the new economic geography (NEG) theory on access to markets. The methodology used here is based on Midelfart-Knarvik et al. (The location of European industry, European Economy Economic Papers 142. European Commission, 2000) and has seen several historical applications. The location of industries is explained through interactions between characteristics of the regions and characteristics of the sectors, of both H-O type and NEG type. The main finding is that endowments, and in particular energy and human capital, were the determinants of the geography of the first Italian industrialization. Market access, at this point of industrialization, mattered only in its domestic formulation and only through economies of scale.

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in Lund UniversityAbstract Italy has been characterized, throughout its history as a unified country, by large regional differentials in the levels of income, industrialization and socio-economic development. This paper aims at testing the New Economic Geography hypothesis on the role of market access in explaining these regional differentials. We first quantify market access of the Italian regions for benchmark years from 1871 to 1911 following Harris (1954). We then use these estimates to study the causal link between GDP per capita and market potential following Head and Mayer (2011). The main result of this paper is that only domestic market potential, which represents the home market, shows a "traditional" North-South divide. When international markets are introduced, the South does not appear to lag behind. Regression analysis confirms that market potential is a strong determinant of GDP per capita only in its domestic formulation.This suggests that the home market in this period mattered far more for growth than the international markets, casting new light on one of the classical explanations to the North-South divide.JEL Classification Numbers: N33, N73, N93, O18, R11.

We present the first comprehensive, long-run estimates of Finnish wealth and its distribution from 1750 to 1900. Using wealth data from 17,279 probate inventories, we show that Finland was very unequal between 1750 and 1850; the top decile owned about 90% of total wealth. This means that Finland was more unequal than the much wealthier economies Britain, France and the US, which goes against the common assumption of richer economies being more unequal. Moreover, when industrialisation took off in Finland, inequality started a downward trajectory. High inequality 1750-1850 was bottom-driven, by a large share of the population owning nothing or close to nothing of value, while economic development after 1850 was pro-equal since the ownership of forests, since long in the hands of the peasantry, became more valuable with the development of forest-based industries. Our findings thus contradict commonplace assumptions that economic growth and industrialisation are associated with more inequality, as well as recent arguments that very few factors beyond catastrophes can decrease inequality. We instead argue for a more inductive and open approach to the determinants of long-run inequality.

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