Article

Escaping from hunger before WW1: the nutritional transition and living standards in Western Europe and USA in the late nineteenth century

Details

Citation

Gazeley I, Holmes R, Newell A, Reynolds K & Rufrancos HG (2022) Escaping from hunger before WW1: the nutritional transition and living standards in Western Europe and USA in the late nineteenth century. Cliometrica. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-022-00259-4

Abstract
Using the US Commissioner of Labor household survey, we estimate calories available to workers’ households in USA, Belgium, Britain, France and Germany in 1888/90. We make raw comparisons of the data and utilise propensity score matching techniques to attempt to overcome differences between the nature of the country samples included in the original survey. We find that US households had on average 500 daily calories per capita more than French and Germans households, with the Belgians and British households closer to the USA. We ask if US workers had more energy for work, once likely differences in stature between national sub-samples are taken into account, and conclude it was a minor advantage. Finally, we ask if economic migration leads to taller children. We find that US-based British households were able to provide more calories than those in Britain in response to an additional child, so that, other things being equal, their children would grow taller.

Keywords
Living standards; Nutrition; International comparisons; Migration

Notes
Output Status: Forthcoming/Available Online

Journal
Cliometrica

StatusIn Press
FundersEconomic and Social Research Council
Publication date online25/11/2022
Date accepted by journal27/10/2022
URLhttp://hdl.handle.net/1893/34783
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC
ISSN1863-2505
eISSN1863-2513

People (1)

Dr Hector Gutierrez Rufrancos

Dr Hector Gutierrez Rufrancos

Senior Lecturer, Economics

Research themes