Economic Dynamics in the Malthusian Era: Evidence from the 1609 Spanish Expulsion of the Moriscos

Abstract

We investigate economic dynamics in the Malthusian era using the 1609 expulsion of Moriscos from Spain. Sharp population declines in former-Morisco districts were accompanied by decreased output and increased per capita output. While these short-run results are consistent with standard Malthusian predictions, Malthusian convergence was delayed up to 1786 in former-Morisco districts. Archival sources and historical accounts suggest extractive institutions and cultural differences may have contributed to delayed convergence in population and output per capita. This historic episode provides an unusually rich setting to examine Malthusian dynamics, highlighting the potential for sustained differences in per capita output in the Malthusian era.For the millennia prior to the demographic transition, models of economic growth focus on capturing 'Malthusian dynamics'. In this Malthusian era, technological growth or population declines are predicted to cause temporary increases in output per capita that dissipate as population grows and the land-to-labour ratio declines.Scholars have generally found empirical support for the traditional Malthusian predictions. In a recent contribution, Ashraf and Galor (2011) show that both land productivity and technology were historically related to population density rather than income per capita. Impacts of the European Black Death are also consistent with this framework (Phelps-Brown and Hopkins, 1981;Hatcher, 1996;Clark, 2005), although population and wages appear to converge slowly following this large population shock.However, the Malthusian era can be more nuanced. Many historical civilisations sustained incomes significantly above subsistence, at least for an elite subset of the population. In addition, recent research has argued that large population shocks could lead to sustained increases in incomes by changing the demographic regime Voth, 2009, 2013a, b). Although such nuance can be reconciled with an augmented Malthusian framework, empirical identification of deviations from the canonical model can be challenging. Such identification issues have often limited empirical analysis in the Malthusian era more generally. For example, efforts to identify the effects of population shocks have generally been hampered by the tendency for disease-driven population shocks to affect entire regions and often

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