22 March 2010
Economic History Society Annual Conference 2010
PRESS BRIEFINGS
NEW ESTIMATES OF SOUTH EAST ENGLAND’S LONG-TERM ECONOMIC DOMINANCE OF THE UK
Over a hundred years ago, at the start of the twentieth century, the South East of England was already the most prosperous region of the UK – and since then, there has been no long-term catch-up by the other regions of the country. These are among the findings of new estimates of the breakdown of UK regional GDP since 1901, calculated by Frank Geary and Tom Stark.
Their research, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference, finds that between 1931 and the mid-1970s, regional inequality declined, perhaps helped by an active regional policy. But in the latter part of the twentieth century, when globalisation led to deindustrialisation in many UK regions, an already relatively more prosperous South East England pulled away from the rest of the country in terms of productivity and prosperity.
Excluding the South East from the analysis reveals that the disparity of incomes between the other regions of the UK has fallen. So while there are two distinct experiences within the UK, it seems as if it is not so much the traditional North-South divide of popular perception but rather South East England versus The Rest.
Economic stability in industrial Britain is much higher today than at the beginning of the twentieth century, and the reason is the ‘de-globalisation’ of the economy as manufacturing industry has shrunk and been replaced by services and public sector employment, much of which are largely immune from international economic forces
These are the conclusions of new research by Professor Jim Tomlinson, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference. He cites the example of Dundee, once perhaps the world’s most globalised city – with the jute industry at its heart – and now with up to four in every ten jobs being in the public sector.
By the end of the twentieth century, Dundee was both de-industrialised and de-globalised, possibly an extreme case, but by no means wholly untypical of industrial Britain. Tomlinson comments: ‘What might be called ‘regional Keynesianism’ is a key feature of Britain’s response to de-industrialisation, as public spending has created millions of new jobs to replace those lost in manufacturing.’
BRITAIN’S MISSED OPPORTUNITY TO LEAD THE WORLD IN RENEWABLE ENERGY
Britain had the opportunity during the 1970s to establish itself as a world-leading centre for renewable energy technology. In the early 1980s, Britain was well placed to capitalise on its early lead. But the government baulked at the increased expenditure required to take devices to the next stage of development, choosing instead to stick with nuclear energy. Thus, Britain failed to grasp a rare opportunity to take an early lead in renewable energy development.
These are among the findings of research by Campbell Wilson, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference. He notes that the UK has the best renewable energy resources in Europe – but we have allowed our competitors to dominate the industry, and failed to take early advantage of those vast, free and infinite energy sources?
The UK government began investing money in the development of renewable energy sources 36 years ago – but depressingly little progress has been achieved and today they account for only a tiny percentage of UK energy consumption.
On 8 January this year, a heavyweight government team, featuring the Prime Minister and Peter Mandelson, gathered the press for a big energy announcement. The government was to invest £75bn in a new offshore wind programme – 25GW of capacity – which by 2020 could create around 70,000 British jobs.
But this could all be too little, too late. Influential commentators were quick to point out that before the new offshore wind farms would be ready, an energy gap would emerge in the UK as old coal and nuclear plants are mothballed over the next ten years. Others highlighted the fact that following the Vestas factory closure in 2009, the UK has no commercial turbine manufacturing capacity, and the investment would create as many jobs in Denmark and Germany as in the UK itself.
COMPETITION BETWEEN BANKS MAY MAKE FINANCIAL INSTABILITY WORSE
Fiercer competition between banks may lead to lower levels of financial stability, according to new research by Christopher Colvin, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference. His study provides historical evidence for those who argue that competition worsens financial stability, possibly by increasing bankers’ moral hazard.
The research, which analyses performance data on over 1,000 co-operative microfinance banks in the Netherlands, shows that banks facing higher levels of competition for deposits may be less able to mitigate the effects of bank runs. It shows that banks operating in markets in which customers can more easily switch between competitors have less liquid investment portfolios and are less likely to be able to withstand financial shocks successfully.
Avoiding corruption and having state institutions that support a market economy are necessary conditions for a country to achieve lasting economic growth on the basis of its natural resources. But effective longer-term development of a country’s resource sector is dependent on whether the sector acquires new technologies and increases its productivity and value-added over time.
These are among the conclusions of new research by Lars Bruno, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference. The study compares the experiences of Sweden and Finland in the nineteenth century and Malaysia and Indonesia in the twentieth century, all countries that have made their endowments of natural resources a blessing rather than a curse.
New research uses skeletal material from the 8th century BC to the 18th century AD to measure changes in people’s average height over centuries as an indicator of their nutritional status and changes in human wellbeing in the very long run. Among the findings of the study by Dr Nikola Koepke, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference:
* Contrary to popular belief, the Roman Empire resulted in reduced not enhanced living conditions. People’s general nutritional status decreased with Roman occupation.
* There was no ‘Dark Ages’. With the decline of Roman supremacy, living conditions for the overall population improved.
* Even prior to the Industrial Revolution, average human height increased by roughly half a centimetre every 1,000 years.
* Urbanisation fails to improve wellbeing as measured by height.
* Consumption of milk is the key factor behind significant regional differences in average height between Mediterranean and Northern Europeans.
MEASURES OF CHANGES IN CHILDREN’S HEIGHT IN PRE-WW2 BRITAIN INDICATE RAPID HEALTH IMPROVEMENTS
Falling infant mortality in Britain in the first half of the twentieth century led to an increase in the health of survivors as indicated by increases in children’s average height. That is the central finding of research by Professor Timothy Hatton, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference.
His study notes that over the 40 years from 1901-5 to 1941-5, infant mortality in England and Wales fell by 88 per thousand, or by 22 per thousand per decade. This translates into an increase in height for 6-9 year-olds of 2.4cm, or about 0.6 cm per decade. And it accounts for more than a quarter of the average height increase of 2.1cm per decade.
These findings provide evidence in support of the ‘scarring effect’ of infant mortality, whereby death rates are a reflection of the general health environment, rather than the ‘selection effect’, which predicts that lower infant mortality suggests ‘survival of the unfit’ and hence shorter survivors.
With the scarring effect, lower infant mortality should be associated with taller survivors, and that is what Professor Hatton’s findings confirm.
THE CERTAINTIES OF LIFE: DEATH, TAXES AND… GETTING SHORTER
Death and taxes are two certainties of life. To that we can add another: shortness! We all become shorter, at least for those who past through middle age and beyond.
With increasing age from about 40 years we begin to shrink, imperceptibly at first, but becoming increasingly more obvious from our mid-50s. This age-related decline in stature is a product of human physiological change, such as osteoporosis, arthritis, spinal compression and other factors.
New research by Professor Stephen Morgan, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference, makes use of unique data on Chinese people in 19th and 20th century Australia to analyse people’s age-related shrinkage in height.
Because of the White Australia Policy, which sought to exclude non-whites and Chinese in particular, each time Chinese residents of Australia went abroad after 1901, they had to obtain a certificate to permit them to re-enter Australia.
These certificates included their height along with pictures and handprints. For some individuals, there are half a dozen or more such certificates over a period of 30 or more years, which provide the data for a better understanding of age-related height shrinkage.
EDUCATION FUNDING IN VICTORIAN BRITAIN: ‘PAYMENT BY RESULTS’ BOOSTED PUPIL ACHIEVEMENT
High stakes testing policies improved school performance in the most educationally disadvantaged regions of Victorian England, according to research by David Mitch, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference.
Under the ‘payments by results’ system of the 1870s and 1880s, national level funding for individual schools depended in part on the outcomes of student exams conducted by school inspectors. This study finds that counties that initially performed poorly on exam results caught up substantially over time under the system.
Payment by results was ultimately abandoned in the 1890s, as competing local educational interests came to perceive that they would do better under more uniform funding policies. But the episode underscores the importance of local accountability in justifying the marked expansion in centralised funding for England’s schools that occurred in the late Victorian era.
BETTER EDUCATION HELPED GERMAN REGIONS ‘CATCH UP’ WITH ENGLAND DURING THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION
Regions of Germany with higher levels of school enrolment were more successful at ‘catching up’ with England during the Industrial Revolution. That is the central finding of research by Sascha Becker, Erik Hornung and Ludger Woessmann, presented at the Economic History Society’s 2010 annual conference.
While formal education may not have been essential for England, the first country to industrialise, it was crucial for regions in the rest of the world that needed to catch up. Focusing on census data from Prussia during the nineteenth century, the study finds that the German state was the world leader in primary education with an average enrolment rate of 80%.
The authors conclude that such a high level of school enrolment was vital to Prussia’s success in overtaking England in many sectors by the end of the nineteenth century. Conversely, if enrolment had been cut in half there would have been hardly any industrialisation in Prussia during the Industrial Revolution.
This historical study resonates with the technology divide in the modern-day global economy. The authors argue that then, just as now, education was vital for countries playing catch-up.
ENDS
