Wealth in Spain, 1900-2014: A Country of Two Lands

Miguel Artola Blanco, Luis Estévez Bauluz and Clara Martinez-Toledano ()
Additional contact information
Luis Estévez Bauluz: PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Clara Martinez-Toledano: PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, WIL - World Inequality Lab

World Inequality Lab Working Papers from HAL

Abstract: This study reconstructs Spain's national wealth from 1900 to 2014. We compare the market value and book value definitions. We then present a new asset-specific decomposition of the long-run movements in the value of wealth into a volume effect (through saving) and a price effect (capital gains or losses). We also investigate the role of offshore assets using administrative records. Our results show that the national wealth-to income ratio followed a J-shaped evolution over the last century, contrary to the U-shaped trend observed in other rich economies. Spain's wealth accumulation also differs in that both agricultural and urban land represented a larger share of national wealth in the early twentieth and twenty-first centuries, respectively. These findings are largely explained by capital gains coming from the housing sector, which account for 45% of the real growth of national wealth over the 1950-2010 period. When offshore assets are considered, Spain's international indebtedness reduced by approximately one quarter since the 2000s. Overall, this study highlights the importance of capital gains, housing, and offshore assets as key elements in the long-term accumulation of wealth.

Keywords: Wealth; Spain; Wealth-income ratios; Historical balance sheets; Housing; Net foreign assets; Economic development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://pse.hal.science/hal-02878216
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://pse.hal.science/hal-02878216/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Wealth in Spain, 1900-2014: A Country of Two Lands (2018)
Working Paper: Wealth in Spain, 1900-2014: A Country of Two Lands (2018)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:wilwps:hal-02878216

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in World Inequality Lab Working Papers from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Caroline Bauer ().