Calendrier du 03 octobre 2018
Development Economics Seminar
Du 03/10/2018 de 16:30 à 18:00
PSE, Room 2.01, 48 Boulevard Jourdan 75014 Paris
SEKHRI Sheetal (University of Virginia)
Reppeling Rapes: Role of FDI in Empowering Women
This paper studies the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on empowerment of women. India experienced a sharp large-scale increase in FDI due to liberalization and reform of policies governing inflows of FDI. We exploit this variation and the spatial distribution of industries affected by the changes to demonstrate that FDI reduces reported rapes. Using nationally representative employment and expenditure data, we establish that greater empowerment due to a rise in women's relative income drives this finding. Analysis of household and voter survey data confirms an increased expenditure on goods that enhance safety and increased voting. We consider a series of alternative explanations and show evidence that disfavors them including “image concerns” that can lead to under-reporting to attract foreign investment.
Economic History Seminar
Du 03/10/2018 de 12:30 à 14:00
Salle R1-13, Campus Jourdan, 48 boulevard Jourdan, 75014 Paris
BENGTSSON Erik (Lund University)
Wealth and inequality in Sweden, c. 1650–1900
Previous studies of wealth inequality in Sweden have used consistent measures back to 1873 (Roine and Waldenström), and less good data for one benchmark year in 1800 (Soltow). Roine and Waldenström’s important study built on tax data. Together with colleagues, I have created a database of 1200+ probate inventories for each of the years 1750, 1800, 1850 and 1900. The Swedish probate inventories are completely encompassing which makes it possible to study all kinds of wealth and more or less all social groups. We have so far produced a general study of inequality and its drivers 1750–1900, and separate papers on the nobility and the farmers. We are now pushing the studies further backwards by focusing on the cities.
The presentation will be a synthetic one, presenting the data that we have used and the conclusions drawn and arguments made in several papers. To summarize, we show and argue that (a) Sweden was as unequal as Britain, France and the US in 1900 – we concede the point to Piketty (2014) that ‘Sweden was not the structurally egalitarian country that we sometimes imagine’ [paper 1]. (b) The Kuznets Curve is not a good explanation of the increase in Swedish inequality in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Instead, between-class, within-sector growth of inequality is more important [1, 3]. (c) The nobility was very wealthy indeed – 61 times more wealthy than the average in 1750, and 19 times more in 1900 [1, 2]. (d) Swedish cities in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were extremely unequal, with top decile shares of wealth around 90 per cent [6]. (e) Equality only came late in Sweden; in a single-authored paper I dismiss explanations of twentieth century Social Democratic egalitarianism as continuations of any old peasant farmer-based equality, and argue that it was popular mobilization after 1870 which made Sweden the most egalitarian economy in the world [4].
The presentation will be based on the following papers:
[1] “Wealth Inequality in Sweden, 1750–1900”. The Economic History Review, 2018, vol. 71 no. 3, pp. 772-794. Co-authored with with Anna Missiaia, Mats Olsson and Patrick Svensson.
[2] “Aristocratic Wealth and Inequality in a Changing Society: Sweden, 1750–1900”. Forthcoming in the Scandinavian Journal of History. Co-authored with Anna Missiaia, Mats Olsson and Patrick Svensson.
[3] “The Wealth of the Swedish Peasant Farmer Class, 1750–1900: Composition and Distribution”. Submitted to Rural History. Co-authored with Patrick Svensson.
[4] “The Swedish Sonderweg in Question: Democratization and Inequality in Comparative Perspective, c. 1750–1920”. Forthcoming in Past & Present.
[5] “Unequal Poverty and Equal Industrialization: Finnish Wealth, 1750–1900”. Forthcoming in Scandinavian Economic History Review. Co-authored with Anna Missiaia, Mats Olsson and Ilkka Nummela.
[6] ”Wealth and Its Distribution in Swedish Cities 1650–1715”. Work in progress. Co-authored with Mats Olsson and Patrick Svensson.