The Gravitational Constant?

Kevin O'Rourke, David Jacks and Alan Taylor

No 15326, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We introduce a new dataset on British exports at the bilateral, commodity-level from 1700 to 1899. We then pit two primary determinants of bilateral trade against one another: the trade-diminishing effects of distance versus the trade-enhancing effects of the British Empire. We find that gravity exerted its pull as early as 1700, but the distance effect then attenuated and had almost vanished by 1800. Meanwhile the empire effect peaked sometime in the late 18th century before significantly declining in value. It was only after 1950 that distance would once again exert the same influence that it has today.

Keywords: Distance; Empire; Gravity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F1 N7 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-gro, nep-his and nep-int
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Working Paper: The Gravitational Constant? (2020)
Working Paper: The Gravitational Constant? (2020)
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