International and National Wheat Market Integration in the 19th Century: A Comovement Analysis

This paper analyses 19th century wheat market integration using comovement analysis borrowed from international business cycle research. This allows for tracking each single city's integration into its respective national market while controlling for international developments. I nd that the biggest push to global wheat market integration happened before 1860, before the railroad could have had substantial e ects. Thus, the increase of U.S. wheat supply after 1870 was not that revolutionary than the established convergence literature suggests. It seems to be fair instead to speak of a major producer accessing the world's biggest market for wheat { Western Europe. The results also call for reconsidering on how national and international markets evolved alongside as the timing turns out to be diverse across Europe. Some countries like Austria-Hungary developed national markets only at the end of the 19th century; others like England integrated nationally early in the 1800s, and later internationally.