Poverty and Prosperity: A Longitudinal Study of Wealth Accumulation, 1850-1860

Richard Steckel

The Review of Economics and Statistics, 1990, vol. 72, issue 2, 275-85

Abstract: This paper depicts and analyzes the wealth distribution and wealth mobility in a national sample of nearly 1,600 households matched in the 1850 and 1860 manuscript schedules of the census. Gini coefficients, a transition matrix, the Shorrocks measure, and a regression model of wealth accumulation are estimated from these data. The findings shed light on theories of the wealth distribution, life-cycle behavior, regional economic performance, accumulation patterns of ethnic and occupational groups, and the empirical basis for critiques of capitalism. Comparisons with modern data show that mid-nineteenth-century households were less mobile at the lower end of the wealth distribution, but more mobile at the upper end. Copyright 1990 by MIT Press.

Date: 1990
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Working Paper: Poverty and Prosperity: A Longitudinal Study of Wealth Accumulation, 1850-1860 (1989)
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