American Precious Metals and their Consequences for Early Modern Europe

Nuno Palma

No 174, Working Papers from European Historical Economics Society (EHES)

Abstract: Over the early modern period and beyond, massive amounts of silver and gold were found and mined in the Americas. In this paper, I review the consequences for the European economies. Some second-order receiver countries such as England benefited in both the short and long run. First-order receivers such as Spain and Portugal also benefited in the short-run, but their continued exposure to the arrival of massive quantities of precious metals eventually led to loss of competitiveness and an institutional resource curse.

Keywords: American Precious Metals; Early Modern Period; Dutch Disease; Political Institutions; Economic growth; comparative development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E02 E4 N14 O11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 20 pages
Date: 2019-12
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-fdg, nep-gro, nep-his and nep-mac
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hes:wpaper:0174

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