Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item:
http://dx.doi.org/10.25673/103183
Title: | State formation and market integration : Germany, 1780-1830 |
Author(s): | Albers, Hakon Pfister, Ulrich |
Issue Date: | 2023 |
Type: | Article |
Language: | English |
Abstract: | The rise of modern states is an important factor for economic development. We test the effects of territorial consolidation and the increase in legal capacity on market integration. The political transformation of Germany in the wake of the Napoleonic Wars, which reduced territorial fragmentation and transformed former semi-autonomous estates to sovereign polities, serves as a natural experiment. We apply a difference-in-differences framework to a new dataset of grain prices and show that territorial consolidation reduced trade costs conditional on trade reforms that replaced heterogenous internal duties by a unified system of external tariffs. The effect was equivalent to a reduction of price gaps by 31 percent. Cities that were part of Prussia both before and after the Wars and experienced trade reform saw a reduction in price gaps of similar magnitude. By contrast, there was no market integration in late-reformer states such as Hanover and Saxony. Trade reforms were the main channel through which territorial consolidation fostered market integration. |
URI: | https://opendata.uni-halle.de//handle/1981185920/105135 http://dx.doi.org/10.25673/103183 |
Open Access: | Open access publication |
License: | (CC BY 4.0) Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 |
Journal Title: | Journal of comparative economics |
Publisher: | Academic Press |
Publisher Place: | Orlando, Fla. |
Appears in Collections: | Open Access Publikationen der MLU |
Files in This Item:
File | Description | Size | Format | |
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1-s2.0-S0147596723000069-main.pdf | 6.97 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |