We analyse the estate composition of the richest 30 per cent of people who died in the Netherlands in 1921 to find that households used a broad range of institutions to meet their financial demands. Goods and services were either paid in cash or settled periodically with suppliers. Despite the strong growth of commercial banking in the previous decades, households still made extensive use of peer-topeer loans, with or without the added security of notarial contracts. Banks only possessed a competitive edge in savings accounts for small surpluses and current accounts, the latter used most frequently by business owners born after 1870. Distance to the nearest bank office did not matter for these people, but wealthy urbanites were more inclined to use banks than their counterparts in the countryside.
This article explores the link between the history of small-firm associations and the development of Dutch financial infrastructure geared toward small firms. In particular, it tests Verdier’s thesis about the origins of state banking using an in-depth case study of the Dutch small-firm movement. This article shows that Dutch small-firm associations did not simply became politically relevant and use their power to lobby for state banking, but rather used the topic of insufficient access to credit to rally support, mobilize members, and obtain subsidies from the government. During this associational process, they had to navigate local contexts and power structures that, in turn, also shaped the financial system. State banking was initially not demanded by small firms, but arose as the result of failed experiments with subsidized banking infrastructure and a changing position of the government on how to intervene in the economy.
This article introduces a newly constructed dataset (i.e. the Tafel v-bis Dataset) containing summary information for all Dutch citizens who died in 1921 and were subject to inheritance taxation. This dataset provides personal and socio-economic information on 24,263 individuals, including their total wealth, age, profession, residence and marital status at their time of death. Consequently, this dataset can be useful for researchers stemming from various academic disciplines. The article first discusses the range of possible uses of the dataset. Then the authors explain how they constructed the dataset and provide the necessary criticism regarding the underlying source material. The dataset is available via the Utrecht University data platform, yoda.
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