Spending, saving, or investing? Risk management in sixteenth-century Dutch households

Jaco Zuijderduijn () and Tine De Moor

No 8, Working Papers from Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History

Abstract: (This paper has been accepted (May 2011) for publication in the Economic History Review) In the past one of the main challenges to households was how to cope with adversity. War, plague, famine, and flood were a constant threat, and could reduce what little improvements families had made in productivity. Economic growth therefore required a means to absorb external adversities. To see how well late medieval households coped with adversity,this investigation focuses on the households of a small town and its surroundings in early modern Holland. Our findings reveal that several severe external events around 1500 had little effect on the general level or distribution of wealth, which suggests certain forms of insurance may have protected the population. The results show that households increasingly invested in capital markets rather than employ such techniques as scattered holdings and hoarding.. This fact indicates that such investment played a vital role in a household’s risk aversion strategy. The change from unproductive to more productive risk-aversion strategies also provides some clues about progress with respect to insurance during Holland’s financial revolution.

Keywords: Capital markets; Risk management; Holland; early modern period. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 25 pages
Date: 2011-07
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Journal Article: Spending, saving, or investing? Risk management in sixteenth-century Dutch households (2013)
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