The #econhist class of 24/25

Examining how war, migration, trade, policy, education and innovation shaped economies and societies over time

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Every year, I compile a list of the job market candidates with an economic history specialisation. (Here is the 2023/2024 list.) I apply three criteria for inclusion: First, they must list on their website that they are on the job market. Second, they must have a job market paper available. Third, they must list economic history as an interest. I asked ChatGPT to summarise their papers for a 12-year-old. (This is a living page. If you are a job market candidate and would like to be added, please email me. If you are included and would like to be removed, just ask.)

For those on the job market, LEAP is advertising a postdoc position for 2025. With South Africa hosting the G20, why not join us in Stellenbosch to rub shoulders with some of the world’s leading policymakers?

• Allison Green (Princeton University) | Networks and Geographic Mobility: Evidence from World War II Navy Ships | This study looks at how friendships made on Navy ships during World War II influenced where sailors moved after the war. Sailors who met shipmates from many different places were more likely to move to new states, especially areas with better job opportunities, thanks to the connections they made.

• Alonso Ahumada (Boston University) | Can Protective Tariffs Induce Industrial Consolidations? Theory and Evidence from the Great Merger Movement | This study looks at how high tariffs in the late 1800s led U.S. companies to combine into larger businesses, called trusts. It found that industries with high tariffs, which protected them from foreign competition, were more likely to merge and become powerful companies.

• Amy Burnett Cross (American University) | Women’s Entry into Nontraditional Occupations: Impacts of the Gender Desegregation of the U.S. Army | This paper looks at how letting women do more Army jobs in 1972 helped them get jobs usually done by men. In places with more Army influence, women started working in these jobs more, showing how changes in the military can help reduce gender gaps in the workplace.

• Anditi Singh (University of British Columbia) | From Blessing to Burden: The long-run effects of India's Green Revolution | This study examines how India’s push to grow more rice and wheat with new farming methods, starting in 1966, reduced crop variety and nutrition. In areas focused on these crops, kids got fewer proteins and nutrients, which has led to health problems like shorter height and more long-term illnesses.

• Anthony Bald (Harvard University) | The Birth of an Occupation: Professional Nursing in the Era of Public Health | This study looks at how nursing turned into a professional job in the early 1900s, with hospitals starting schools to train nurses. Women who lived close to these schools often became nurses, especially if they were from wealthier families, leading nursing to become a largely female career in the U.S.

• Antonio Laplana (Tilburg University) | Beyond the war on drugs: Portugal’s drug decriminalization reform and Retornados migration | This study examines Portugal’s decision to decriminalize drugs like heroin and cocaine in 2001, finding it led to less crime without more drug use. The policy gave drug users better access to jobs and mental health care, which likely helped reduce crimes like theft.

• Ariel Akerman (Boston University) | Deforestation and the Demographic Transition: Lessons from Brazil | This study shows that slower population growth in Brazil helped protect the Amazon from being cut down. It found that as fewer people were born, deforestation slowed, and if this population drop had happened later, a lot more of the Amazon would be gone today.

• Bin Huang (University of Zurich) | Institution, Diversity, and Cooperation: Lessons from Rural China | This paper looks at how people from different ethnic groups worked together in China during a forced integration campaign from the 1950s to 1980s. At first, it caused problems and hurt the economy, but over time it helped different groups form stronger connections and work better together, especially after new rules made cooperation easier.

• Chenxi Tang (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) | The Long-run Impacts of Ancient Chinese Civil Exams on Contemporary Local Innovation | This paper looks at how China's ancient civil exams, which chose top academics for government jobs, still influence innovation today. It finds that places with more top exam scorers in the past now have more scientists, engineers, and important inventions, showing how the exams shaped modern progress.

• Christopher Roudiez (University of Maryland) | Lucky Number 158: A New Dataset to Study the Economic Effects of WWII Service Using the Draft Lottery | This study looks at how World War II service changed veterans’ jobs and education afterward, using the draft lottery to compare fairly. It finds that veterans were a bit less likely to start their own businesses, helping us understand the effects of military service on careers.

• Chun Chee Kok (Monash University) | Ethnic Proximity and Politics: Evidence from Colonial Resettlement in Malaysia | This paper studies how a colonial program in Malaysia, which moved ethnic Chinese into isolated camps, changed nearby communities. It finds that areas closer to the camps had stronger economies and less support for ethno-nationalistic politics, likely because of better interactions between different ethnic groups.

• Daniel Teeter (Queen’s University) |  The Impact of Internal Trade Liberalizations on Plant Productivity and Markups | This study examines how two Canadian trade deals changed how factories work and trade with other provinces. The New West Partnership and Trade Agreement (NWPTA) helped factories be more productive and trade more, while the other deal, the TCA, had less effect, showing that the NWPTA’s wider approach worked better.

• Daria Bakhareva (UC Berkeley) | Crowding In or Out? Goal Gradient Trackers and Charitable Contributions | To be added.

• Dongkyu Yang (University of Colorado) | Time to Accumulate: The Great Migration and the Rise of the American South | This study examines how the Second Great Migration (1940–1970), when many people left the South for the North, led the South to use more machines and technology due to fewer workers. This shift improved productivity in farming and manufacturing and moved jobs away from farms, showing that fewer workers can sometimes push an economy to grow in new ways.

• Elijah Locke (Boston University) | Ethnic-Occupational Niches: Evidence from the Age of Mass Migration | This study looks at why some immigrant groups end up in specific jobs, finding that immigrants often work in fields where they already have skills, with strong community ties helping them find similar jobs. These connections play a big role in job choices, passing down job patterns across generations.

  

• Emiliano Harris (Cornell University) | The First Era of American Federal Public Housing (1940-1960) - Effects on Neighborhoods | This study examines how early public housing programs in the 1930s helped create neighborhoods with a mix of income levels by attracting families with low but steady incomes. Unlike later public housing, which often led to high-poverty areas, these early programs reduced poverty concentration in targeted neighborhoods.

• Eric H Wilhelm (George Mason University) | Crafts Guilds and City Growth | This paper studies how craft guilds in Western Europe from 1000 to 1800 helped cities grow, especially before and after the Black Death. It finds that cities with guilds were bigger and grew faster, with populations increasing by up to 10% per century, particularly during the medieval period.

• Guohui Jiang (University of Zurich) | No fairness, no cooperation: Draft dodging by the rich and voluntary enlistment in World War II | This study shows that during World War II, wealthier Americans were less likely to be drafted, which discouraged poorer people from volunteering. When people saw that richer neighbors weren't being drafted as much, they felt the system was unfair and were less willing to join the service.

• Henry Downes (University of Notre Dame) | Did Organized Labor Induce Labor? Unionization and the American Baby Boom | This study looks at how labor unions, which grew a lot after 1935, influenced family sizes in the U.S. It found that unions helped families have more children by providing higher wages and job security, which contributed to the Baby Boom.

• J. Landin Smith (UC Berkeley) | Education and Local Markets for (Child) Labor: Evidence from the Department of the US South | This paper looks at how education policies affect wages and finds that when more people go to school, it helps both educated and less-educated workers earn more. Education policies create jobs where high-skill and low-skill workers work together, boosting wages for everyone.

• Jacob van Leeuwen (Texas A&M University) | The long run effects of anti-immigrant institutional discrimination: Evidence from Philadelphia | This study examines how a 19th-century policy in Philadelphia that targeted Irish immigrants led to more Irish men being jailed and struggling with jobs for years. Those who moved away found better opportunities, showing that leaving helped them escape the effects of discrimination.

• Katarina Fedorov (Boston University) | Beyond the Broom: The Decline of Women in Domestic Service | This study looks at why young white women in the U.S. stopped working as domestic servants between 1880 and 1930. With more education and new technology like electricity, they found better-paying jobs, which changed the kinds of work women did.

• Kaveh Sanjabi Malayeri (Queen’s University) | The War on Drugs in the Cotton Kingdom | This study examines how places in the U.S. South that once focused heavily on cotton farming now have higher drug arrest rates for Black people, but not for white people. It suggests that old harsh attitudes toward Black workers may still affect how police enforce drug laws in these communities today.

• Kexin Feng (California Institute of Technology) | Trade, Industrialization, and Regional Disparities: Evidence from China during the Warlord Era | This paper looks at how trade with other countries helped China grow during the Warlord Era (1912–1928), even though the government was weak. It shows that access to foreign machines and expensive imported goods encouraged people to start factories, helping the economy grow despite the political instability.

• Li Duan (University of Hong Kong) | Awakening Latent Human Capital: The Opening-up and Entrepreneurship in 19th-century China | This paper looks at why Europe got ahead in technology while China's progress slowed down hundreds of years ago. By looking at how people learned skills and created new ideas in the past, the paper wants to understand what this means for how countries grow and innovate today.

• Lisa-Cheree Martin (Stellenbosch University) | On a Mission: Literacy outcomes and self-selection at Cape missions | This paper asks if farms with skilled workers near mission stations helped freed people learn to read after slavery ended in the Cape Colony. It finds that places with more skilled workers had better reading rates, thanks to both the work of missionaries and the local need for education.

• Louise Huiqian Song (Simon Fraser University) | Marriage, Property, and Aristocracy: The Role of Parental Involvement in British Noble Marriages, 1650-1940 | This study examines how British aristocrats passed down their estates and how it affected who heirs married. When fathers managed the estate, heirs had less money to offer because it was shared with siblings, making them less likely to marry other aristocrats.

• Luis Jaramillo (University of Maryland) | Innovation Spurred: Evidence from South Korea’s Big R&D Push | This study looks at how South Korea's first major research program, from 1992 to 2001, helped the country grow by supporting new technology. The program led to more important inventions and increased exports, helping South Korea move towards an economy based on knowledge and innovation.

• Malik Hussain (George Mason University) | Pox, Piety, and Paradox: The Economics of Vaccination in British India | This paper looks at how cultural beliefs in colonial India affected smallpox vaccinations, especially in Hindu communities. It finds that areas with more Hindus had fewer vaccinations, which led to more young widows and unmarried people, showing the lasting effects of vaccine hesitancy.

• Mark Van Orden (UC Irvine) | Pollution-Income Tradeoffs of Industrialization: Evidence from World War I | This study looks at how the fast growth of the steel industry during World War I had both good and bad effects on people’s health. While it brought more jobs to steel-focused cities, polluted water from the factories led to higher infant death rates in areas downstream.

• Marshall Mo (Stanford University) | Land Market Liberalization and Firm Dynamics: Theory and Evidence from India | This study looks at how changing land rules in India helped factories grow and become more productive. By letting successful companies use more land, it led to more new products and helped the economy grow.

  

• Nicholas Fitzhenry (LSE) | Death, Disease, and Healthcare in Apartheid South Africa | This project looks at how health was different for racial groups during apartheid in South Africa, such as who got sick more often or had less access to doctors. It shows that apartheid rules created big health gaps that still affect people today.

• Nicholas Gachet (University of Manchester) | Property with different rights: The long-run effects of Ecuador's agrarian reform | This study compares areas in Ecuador that received public land transfers with those affected by land expropriations during agrarian reform. It finds that regions with land transfers became more productive and grew a variety of crops, while areas forced to grow only rice are still stuck in rice farming and face challenges with unstable credit.

• Pablo Valenzuela-Casasempere (University of British Columbia) | Displacement and infrastructure provision: Evidence from the Interstate Highway System | This study looks at how people’s lives changed when they had to move because of new highways being built. It found that these people often ended up in poorer neighborhoods, didn’t live as long, and had other long-term effects on their health and happiness, showing that big projects like highways can sometimes hurt people’s lives in ways we don’t always see.

• Patrick R Fitzsimmons (George Mason University) | Blood and Iron: Political Fragmentation in the Ancient Eastern Mediterranean | This study looks at how the discovery of iron around 1200 BCE changed societies by giving more people access to weapons. Iron was easier to get than bronze, which reduced the power of elites and led to more fighting and smaller, divided political groups.

• Paul Lowood (UC Irvine) | Fiscal Capacity, Railway Federalism, and German Railway Development, 1835-1885 | This paper studies how Germany’s ability to collect taxes affected railroad-building decisions. It finds that as German states collected more money, they shifted from building railroads themselves to letting private companies do it, while still keeping railroad construction going at the same pace.

• Ruoran Cheng (LSE) | Route to Cities: Natural Endowments under Varying Transitions | This study looks at how natural features like rivers and coasts affected where cities in China were built over 2,000 years. It found that things like trade, government rules, and taxes made certain places, like riversides or ports, more important for cities at different times.

• Sarah Ferber (Tuebingen University) | The Development and Determinants of Numeracy in Sub-Saharan Africa | This study looks at what helps countries grow over a long time, focusing on health and education. It studies Sub-Saharan Africa during and after colonial times, using old records, surveys, and maps to understand how people’s skills and well-being improved.

• Simone Arrigoni (Trinity College Dublin) | Beyond Borders, Within Societies: Inequality and the Global Transmission of US Monetary Policy | This study examines how US monetary policy affects different countries, depending on their levels of income inequality. It finds that countries with more inequality experience larger GDP drops when the US tightens policy, but in emerging markets, limited access to global finances helps reduce this effect.

• Stefan Smutny (University of Vienna) | Taxed Out? How Early 20th Century Regional Tax Adoptions Shaped Interstate Firm Relocations | This paper studies whether businesses moved to different states after corporate income taxes were introduced in the early 1900s. It finds that taxed states saw 13% more companies relocate, especially in industries like manufacturing and services, with most moves happening near state borders.

• Tiange Du (University of Connecticut) | Institutions and the struggle of private ownership: the case of China | This study looks at China’s economic history from the late Qing dynasty to 1956, comparing government-supported businesses with private ones. It finds that too much government control often hurt state businesses, while private companies succeeded by being flexible and focusing on free enterprise, showing the need for a balance between government help and business freedom.

• Tomas Breach (UC Berkeley) | Misallocation as a Source of Business Cycles: The Case of the 1970s Oil Recessions | This study looks at how U.S. rules on oil prices and distribution during the 1970s made it harder to deal with supply problems like the Arab Oil Embargo. It shows that these rules caused worse shortages, hurt car sales, and made the economic impact of the crisis much bigger.

• Varun Kapoor (University of Chicago) | Limited commitment and liquidity constraints in informal labor markets: Evidence from India | This study explores why jobs in informal markets in lower-income countries often don’t last long and why workers sometimes refuse available jobs. It shows that workers like daily pay to avoid unpaid wages, while companies prefer end-of-job pay to stop workers from quitting early; better job rules and credit for companies could help both sides work together more smoothly.

• William LeRoy (University of Maryland) | The Impact of Conservative Media on Southern Partisan Realignment | This paper examines how Carl McIntire, a 1960s radio host who supported segregation, influenced political changes in the South. It finds that areas with stronger access to his broadcasts saw a decrease in Democratic support, helping shift the region's political views.

• Yannis Kastis (University College London) | Organizational Practices and Technology Adoption: Evidence from Jewish Immigration and the Tailoring Industry in England | To be added.

• Youn Baek (NYU Stern) | Cultural Exchange and the Birth of International Development | This paper studies how American Protestant missionaries helped shape the country’s support for foreign aid. It shows that communities with more missionaries were more likely to back foreign aid, which influenced government leaders to view global issues with a sense of moral duty.

• Youwei Xing (Clemson University) | The Erie Canal and the Economic Transformaton of Nineteenth-Century New York State | This paper looks at how canals helped towns grow during early modernization. It finds that canal towns moved from farming to manufacturing and trade, grew in population, created new towns, and had more banks, but these changes stayed mostly local.

• Zane Jennings (LSE) | The Political Economy of Permanent Capital: The English East India Company, 1657-1721 | This study looks at how the English East India Company became more like a modern corporation in the 17th century. It shows how changes in England’s politics after the Civil War affected the company’s ties to the government and its internal balance of power.

• Zhen Gu (University of Arizona) | Immigrant Entrepreneurship in the US 1910-1940 | This paper looks at how immigrants in the early 1900s were more likely to start their own businesses than people born in the U.S. Since job choices were limited and immigrant communities were growing, many immigrants opened their own businesses, and their children often took over these family businesses too.

• Zsigmond Pálvölgyi (University of Michigan) | Did Decreasing Residential Segregation Reduce Racial Wealth Inequality? | This paper looks at how the 1968 Fair Housing Act (FHA) changed housing and wealth in the U.S. It shows that the FHA helped Black families move to better neighborhoods, reduced segregation, and increased their housing wealth, but it also made wealth gaps bigger for middle-income families.

‘The #econhist class of 24/25’ was first published on Our Long Walk. Kelsey Lemon provided helpful research assistance. Support more such writing by signing up for a paid subscription. The images were created with Midjourney v6.1.