scan0004.jpgBasic Information

Executive office for the Social Science

 

Research Interests:

Vita (PDF)


Classes

Economics/SS 129: American Economic History (Syllabus as a pdf) Course web site: American Economic History

BEM Economics 185: The Political Economy of corporate governance 2007-08 Syllabus

SS229 Theoretical and Quantitative Dimensions of Historical Development 2007-08 Syllabus


 

Caltech Early Modern Group Meetings

2008 Program

2009 Program

2010 Program


Books

Surviving Large Losses; Financial Crises, the Middle Class, and the Development of Capital Markets

With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. Harvard University Presss 2007.

o        http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/HOFSUR.html

 

Finance, Intermediaries, and Economic Development.

Co Edited with Stanley L. Engerma, Philip T. Hoffman, and Kenneth L. Sokoloff.

o         http://books.cambridge.org/0521820545.htm

 

Analytic Narratives.

With Robert Bates, Avner Greif, Margaret Levi, and Barry Weingast. Princeton University Press, 1998.

o        http://press.princeton.edu/titles/6355.html

 

Priceless Markets; The Political Economy of Credit Markets in Paris 1660-1870

With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. University of Chicago Press 2000

o        In English Priceless Markets

o        In French see: Des Marchés sans Prix editions de l’EHESS 2001

 

The Fruits of Revolution; Property Rights, Litigation and French Agriculture, 1700-1860

Cambridge University Press. 1992.

o        http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521392204


Papers by Areas of Interest


Institutional Change and Economic Growth

This work focuses on how the French Revolution rewrote the rules that governed invest in agricultural infrastructure and enabled a significant increase in investment in the section when compared with the period before 1789


Financial Markets

Published Papers

Rural Credit in France

·         Rural Credit Markets and Aggregate Shocks: The Experience of Nuits St. Georges in Burgundy, 1756-1776.” Journal of Economic History, Vol. 54, June 1994, 288-306.

·         Credit Markets and Economic Change in Southeastern France 1630-1788.” Explorations in Economic History, Vol. 30, April 1993, 129-157.

Credit Markets in Paris

·         What Do Notaries Do?: Overcoming Asymmetric Information in Financial Markets: The Case of Paris, 1751. With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics, Vol. 154 (3), September 1998: 499-530. (PDF)

·         Deposits, Bankruptcy, and Notarial Credit in Late Eighteenth-Century Paris.” With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay.  In Paul Servais ed., Réseaux et cultures du crédit du XVIème au XXème siècle en Europe. University of Louvain Press, 1997, 245-267.

·         Redistribution and Long-Term Private Debt in Paris, 1660-1726. With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. Journal of Economic History, Vol. 55, June 1995, 256-284. (PDF)

·         Economie et Politique: Les marchés du crédit à Paris 1750-1840.” With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. Annales E.S.C., Vol. 1, January 1994,5-98.

Public Debt in Burgundy

Working papers

·         The Old Economics of Information and the Remarkable Persistence of Traditional Credit Markets in France 1740-1899. With Philip T. Hoffman and Gilles Postel-Vinay. Fall 2007.

·         Is Trust an Ultimate Cause? Its Role in the Long Run Development of Financial Markets in France, in Cook, Levi, and Hardin eds. Russell Sage Trust Initiative Capstone Volume. with Philip T. Hoffman  Gilles Postel-Vinay.


 
Wealth Inequality

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The figure displays the share of wealth left behind by the richest individuals in Paris

Published papers

American Economic Review. Vol. 96 (1), 2006, 236-56. (PDF)

Working papers

The increased concentration of wealth in Paris 1807-1912; of Revolution and Demography with Thomas Piketty, and Gilles Postel Vinay, Fall 2006.

 

Law and the Evolution of Firm Governance

The figure displays the proportion of new multi-owner firms registered at the Paris tribunal of Commerce by organizational form

Published papers

Working papers

Organizing Middle-Sized Firms in the United States and France, 1830-2000. With Naomi R. Lamoreaux. Fall 2005.

Pouvoir et propriété dans l’entreprise pour une histoire international des sociétés à responsabilité limitée, forthcoming in Annales: E.S.C., January 2008. With Timothy Guinnane, Ron Harris, and Naomi R. Lamoreaux. (English version Ownership and Control in the Entrepreneurial Firm:  An International History of Private Limited Companies, Yale University Economic Growth Center Discussion Paper #959, December 2007)


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