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New media and competition: printing and Europe's transformation after Gutenberg

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  • Jeremiah Dittmar
  • Skipper Seabold

Abstract

We study the role of book content in economic, religious, and institutional development after the introduction of printing, and the role of competition in determining the amount and content of local printing. We focus on (1) business education content and (2) religious ideas during the Protestant Reformation. We construct data on printing output and competition in European cities 1454-1600.We document positive relationships between business education content and city growth, and Protestant content and institutional change. We find competition predicts content. We confirm the relationships between competition, content, and outcomes using printer deaths as a source of exogenous variation.

Suggested Citation

  • Jeremiah Dittmar & Skipper Seabold, 2019. "New media and competition: printing and Europe's transformation after Gutenberg," CEP Discussion Papers dp1600, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1600
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Davide Cantoni & Jeremiah Dittmar & Noam Yuchtman, 2018. "Religious Competition and Reallocation: the Political Economy of Secularization in the Protestant Reformation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(4), pages 2037-2096.
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    Cited by:

    1. Becker, Sascha O. & Francisco J. Pino & Vidal-Robert, Jordi, 2021. "Freedom of the Press? Catholic Censorship during the Counter-Reformation," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1356, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    2. Raffaele Danna, 2019. "Figuring out: the spread of Hindu-Arabic numerals in the European tradition of practical mathematics (13th-16th centuries)," Working Papers 35, Department of Economic and Social History at the University of Cambridge, revised 03 Aug 2019.
    3. Beattie, Graham, 2020. "Advertising and media capture: The case of climate change," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).
    4. Rapone, Tancredi, 2022. "Measuring human capital in the united states using copyright title pages, 1790-1870," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 113448, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    competition; firms; media; technology; institutions; religion; politics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L1 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance
    • L2 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior
    • N0 - Economic History - - General
    • N8 - Economic History - - Micro-Business History
    • O3 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights
    • O4 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity

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