IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/auu/hpaper/115.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Gender(ed) equity: The growth of female shareholding in Australia, 1857-1937

Author

Listed:
  • Grant Fleming
  • Zhangxin (Frank) Liu
  • David Merrett
  • Simon Ville

Abstract

An evolving literature addresses the role of women in business in colonial Australia. We know less about their contribution as investors, a topic that has received much greater attention in other nations, particularly Britain. We address this lacuna by deploying a dataset of shareholders in Australian companies between 1857 and 1937, covering all major sectors in the economy. We calculate the female share of shareholdings and shareowners, their occupational and geographic backgrounds, and analyse their investment patterns and behaviours including their risk profiles and portfolio construction decisions. Our findings suggest that ‘gender equity’ – and more - had been reached, for at least some companies, by the interwar period. Women investors came from many walks of life, had different motives, and as a class appear to have largely acted independently.

Suggested Citation

  • Grant Fleming & Zhangxin (Frank) Liu & David Merrett & Simon Ville, 2023. "Gender(ed) equity: The growth of female shareholding in Australia, 1857-1937," CEH Discussion Papers 05, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    • Handle: RePEc:auu:hpaper:115
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cbe.anu.edu.au/researchpapers/CEH/WP202305.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Josephine Maltby & Janette Rutterford, 2006. "'She possessed her own fortune': Women investors from the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth century," Business History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(2), pages 220-253.
    2. Rutterford, Janette & Sotiropoulos, Dimitris P., 2017. "The Rise of the Small Investor in the United States and United Kingdom, 1895 to 1970," Enterprise & Society, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(3), pages 485-535, September.
    3. Graeme G. Acheson & Gareth Campbell & Áine Gallagher & John D. Turner, 2021. "Independent women: investing in British railways, 1870–1922," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(2), pages 471-495, May.
    4. Graeme G. Acheson & John D. Turner, 2011. "Investor behaviour in a nascent capital market: Scottish bank shareholders in the nineteenth century," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(1), pages 188-213, February.
    5. Janette Rutterford & Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos & Carry van Lieshout, 2023. "Individual investors and social ownership structures in the UK before the 1930s: Joint holdings and trustee investment," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 76(2), pages 661-692, May.
    6. Hannah Forsyth, 2019. "Reconsidering Women's Role in the Professionalisation of the Economy: Evidence from the Australian Census 1881–1947," Australian Economic History Review, Economic History Society of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 59(1), pages 55-79, March.
    7. Pauline Grosjean & Rose Khattar, 2019. "It’s Raining Men! Hallelujah? The Long-Run Consequences of Male-Biased Sex Ratios," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 86(2), pages 723-754.
    8. John D. Turner, 2009. "Wider share ownership?: investors in English and Welsh Bank shares in the nineteenth century1," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 62(s1), pages 167-192, August.
    9. Merrett, David T. & Ville, Simon, 2009. "Financing Growth: New Issues by Australian Firms, 1920–1939," Business History Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 83(3), pages 563-589, October.
    10. Janette Rutterford & Josephine Maltby, 2006. "“The Widow, The Clergyman And The Reckless”: Women Investors In England, 1830—1914," Feminist Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(1-2), pages 111-138.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Janette Rutterford & Dimitris P. Sotiropoulos & Carry van Lieshout, 2023. "Individual investors and social ownership structures in the UK before the 1930s: Joint holdings and trustee investment," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 76(2), pages 661-692, May.
    2. Grant Fleming & Zhangxin (Frank) Liu & David Merrett & Simon Ville, 2024. "Shining a Light: Female Investors in the Australian Gas Light Company, 1836-1940," CEH Discussion Papers 05, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    3. Graeme G. Acheson & Christopher Coyle & David P. Jordan & John D. Turner, 2020. "Share trading activity and the rise of the rentier in the UK before 1920," Business History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 62(6), pages 982-1001, August.
    4. Graeme G. Acheson & Gareth Campbell & John D. Turner, 2017. "Who financed the expansion of the equity market? Shareholder clienteles in Victorian Britain," Business History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 59(4), pages 607-637, May.
    5. Acheson, Graeme G. & Campbell, Gareth & Gallagher, Áine & Turner, John D., 2018. "Independent women: Shareholders in the age of the suffragettes," QUCEH Working Paper Series 2018-09, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    6. Quinn, William & Turner, John D., 2021. "Riding the bubble or taken for a ride? Investors in the British bicycle mania," QUCEH Working Paper Series 21-07, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    7. Graeme G. Acheson & Gareth Campbell & Áine Gallagher & John D. Turner, 2021. "Independent women: investing in British railways, 1870–1922," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(2), pages 471-495, May.
    8. Helen Doe, 2010. "Waiting for her ship to come in? The female investor in nineteenth‐century sailing vessels," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 63(1), pages 85-106, February.
    9. Janette Rutterford & David R. Green & Josephine Maltby & Alastair Owens, 2011. "Who comprised the nation of shareholders? Gender and investment in Great Britain, c. 1870–1935," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 64(1), pages 157-187, February.
    10. Colvin, Christopher L., 2015. "The past, present and future of banking history," QUCEH Working Paper Series 15-05, Queen's University Belfast, Queen's University Centre for Economic History.
    11. Alger, Ingela, 2021. "On the evolution of male competitiveness," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 190(C), pages 228-254.
    12. Victoria Baranov & Ralph Haas & Pauline Grosjean, 2023. "Men. Male-biased sex ratios and masculinity norms: evidence from Australia’s colonial past," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 339-396, September.
    13. Gareth Campbell & Áine Gallagher & Richard S. Grossman, 2024. "Living La Vida Loca? Remote Investing in Latin America, 1869-1929," CESifo Working Paper Series 11562, CESifo.
    14. Ian Webster, 2022. "Making the municipal capital market in nineteenth‐century England," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 75(1), pages 56-79, February.
    15. Sascha O. Becker, 2022. "Forced displacement in history: Some recent research," Australian Economic History Review, Economic History Society of Australia and New Zealand, vol. 62(1), pages 2-25, March.
    16. Giuliano, Paola, 2020. "Gender and Culture," IZA Discussion Papers 13607, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    17. Fenske, James & Gupta, Bishnupriya & Yuan, Song, 2022. "Demographic Shocks and Women’s Labor Market Participation: Evidence from the 1918 Influenza Pandemic in India," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 82(3), pages 875-912, September.
    18. Hilt, Eric & Jaremski, Matthew & Rahn, Wendy, 2022. "When Uncle Sam introduced Main Street to Wall Street: Liberty Bonds and the transformation of American finance," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(1), pages 194-216.
    19. Jörn Boehnke & Victor Gay, 2022. "The Missing Men: World War I and Female Labor Force Participation," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 57(4), pages 1209-1241.
    20. Grant Fleming & Frank Liu & David Merrett & Simon Ville, 2022. "Share ownership and the introduction of no liability legislation in nineteenth-century Australia," CEH Discussion Papers 11, Centre for Economic History, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:auu:hpaper:115. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/chanuau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.