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Land-use profiles of agrarian income and land ownership inequality in the province of Barcelona in mid-nineteenth century

Author

Listed:
  • Enric Tello

    (Department of Economic History and Institutions,Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Barcelona (Spain))

  • Marc Badia-Miró

    (Department of Economic History and Institutions,Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Barcelona (Spain))

Abstract

According to the existing literature, when land remained the most abundant factor an increase in market integration is expected to lead to a greater inequality in wealth or income distribution. However, several case studies on the vineyard specialization experienced in Catalonia during the 18th and 19th centuries suggested another outcome: land ownership and agrarian income became less uneven, not the opposite. The outstanding interpretation posed by Catalan rural historians deserves to be confirmed or rejected by applying different inequality and polarization indices (Gini, Theil and top incomes), and innovative methods (inequality possible frontier and extraction ratios), to the big dataset we have been able to assemble with the information provided for every cadastral taxpayer of each municipality in the Distribution of Personal Wealth in Real Estate Ownership in the Province of Barcelona published in 1852 by the Official Gazette, combined with other population and land-use data listed in a Land-Use Statistics of the Province of Barcelona compiled in 1858. The results confirm that landownership and income inequality were lower in winegrowing municipalities than in cereal-cropping or forest ones, in spite of the fact that commercial specialization and higher population densities could have meant an extended frontier of possible inequality.

Suggested Citation

  • Enric Tello & Marc Badia-Miró, 2011. "Land-use profiles of agrarian income and land ownership inequality in the province of Barcelona in mid-nineteenth century," Documentos de Trabajo de la Sociedad de Estudios de Historia Agraria 1101, Sociedad de Estudios de Historia Agraria.
    • Handle: RePEc:seh:wpaper:1101
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Milanovic, Branko & Lindert, Peter & Williamson, Jeffrey, 2007. "Measuring Ancient Inequality," MPRA Paper 5388, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Peter H. Lindert & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2003. "Does Globalization Make the World More Unequal?," NBER Chapters, in: Globalization in Historical Perspective, pages 227-276, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Milanovic, Branko, 2010. "Level of income and income distribution in mid-18th century France, according to Francois Quesnay," MPRA Paper 27692, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Enric Tello & Marc Badia-Miro & Xavier Cusso & Ramon Garrabou & Francesc Valls, 2008. "Explaining vineyard specialization in the province of Barcelona (Spain) in the mid-19th century," Working Papers in Economics 201, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia.
    5. Vries,Jan de, 2008. "The Industrious Revolution," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521895026, September.
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    Cited by:

    1. Galán, E. & Padró, R. & Marco, I. & Tello, E. & Cunfer, G. & Guzmán, G.I. & González de Molina, M. & Krausmann, F. & Gingrich, S. & Sacristán, V. & Moreno-Delgado, D., 2016. "Widening the analysis of Energy Return on Investment (EROI) in agro-ecosystems: Socio-ecological transitions to industrialized farm systems (the Vallès County, Catalonia, c.1860 and 1999)," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 336(C), pages 13-25.
    2. Samuel Garrido, 2017. "The fruit of inequality: wine, efficiency, agrarian contracts and property rights in Catalonia (1898-1935)," Documentos de Trabajo (DT-AEHE) 1701, Asociación Española de Historia Económica.
    3. Marc Badia-Miro & Enric Tello, 2013. "An agency-oriented model to explain vine-growing specialization in the province of Barcelona (Catalonia, Spain) in the mid-nineteenth century," Working Papers in Economics 290, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia.
    4. Lluis Parcerisas & Joan Marull & Joan Pino & Enric Tello & Francesc Coll & Corina Basnou, 2012. "Land use changes, landscape ecology and their socioeconomic driving forces in the Spanish Mediterranean coast (the Maresme County, 1850-2005)," Working Papers in Economics 273, Universitat de Barcelona. Espai de Recerca en Economia.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    agrarian income distribution; land ownership; personal inequality; regional inequality; land-use patterns; tax burden;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • N53 - Economic History - - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment and Extractive Industries - - - Europe: Pre-1913
    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • H24 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Personal Income and Other Nonbusiness Taxes and Subsidies
    • Q15 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Land Ownership and Tenure; Land Reform; Land Use; Irrigation; Agriculture and Environment

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