Pre‐Industrial Inequality

Branko Milanović · Peter H. Lindert · Jeffrey Gale Williamson

401 citations0/0 files storedThe Economic Journal

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Income, Poverty, and Inequality Historical Economic and Social Studies Economic Theory and Policy

Abstract

Is inequality largely the result of the Industrial Revolution? Or, were pre‐industrial incomes as unequal as they are today? This article infers inequality across individuals within each of the 28 pre‐industrial societies, for which data were available, using what are known as social tables. It applies two new concepts: the inequality possibility frontier and the inequality extraction ratio. They compare the observed income inequality to the maximum feasible inequality that, at a given level of income, might have been ‘extracted’ by those in power. The results give new insights into the connection between inequality and economic development in the very long run.

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References

2001The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation 2019Economic Growth and Income Inequality 2012The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation: Reply 2003Income Inequality in the United States, 1913-1998 1996A New Data Set Measuring Income Inequality 2001The world economy: a millennial perspective 2000History Lessons: Institutions, Factor Endowments, and Paths of Development in the New World 2004The world economy: historical statistics

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