Human Capital Formation from Occupations: The ‘Deskilling Hypothesis’ Revisited

Alexandra de Pleijt () and Jacob Weisdorf

No 57, Working Papers from Utrecht University, Centre for Global Economic History

Abstract: We use occupational titles from English parish registers in an attempt to test the deskilling hypothesis, i.e. the notion that England’s Industrial Revolution was mainly skill saving. We code the occupational titles of over 30,000 male workers according to the skillcontent of their work (using HISCLASS) to track the evolution of working skills in England between 1550 and 1850. Although we observe a minor rise in the share of ‘high-quality workmen’ deemed necessary by Mokyr and others to facilitate the Industrial Revolution, such as joiners, turners, and wrights, we also find considerable growth in the share of unskilled workers, from 20% in around 1700 to 39% in around 1850, fed mainly by falling shares of semi-skilled blue-collar workers, such as tailors, shoemakers, and weavers. This supports the view that England’s Industrial Revolution was not only skill saving on average but also involved a proletarianization of the English workforce.

Keywords: Deskilling; HISCLASS; Human Capital; Industrial Revolution; Occupations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 44 pages
Date: 2014-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-gro, nep-his, nep-hrm and nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Related works:
Journal Article: Human capital formation from occupations: the ‘deskilling hypothesis’ revisited (2017)
Journal Article: Human capital formation from occupations: the ‘deskilling hypothesis’ revisited (2017)
Working Paper: Human Capital Formation from Occupations: The ‘Deskilling Hypothesis’ Revisited (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ucg:wpaper:0057

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