Allen, Robert C., Bassino, Jean-Pascal, Ma, Debin 
ORCID: 0000-0002-9604-8724, Moll-Murata, Christine and Zanden, Jan Luiten van
(2009)
Wages, prices, and living standards in China, 1738-1925: in comparison with Europe, Japan and India.
Economic History Working Papers (123/09).
Department of Economic History, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK.
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Abstract
This paper develops data on the history of wages and prices in Beijing, Canton, Suzhou/Shanghai in China from the eighteenth century to the twentieth and compare them with leading cities in Europe, Japan and India in terms of nominal wages, the cost of living, and the standard of living. In the eighteenth century, the real income of building workers in Asia was similar to that of workers in the backward parts of Europe but far behind that in the leading economies in north western Europe. Real wages declined in China in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and rose slowly in the late nineteenth and early twentieth with little cumulative change for two hundred years. The income disparities of the early twentieth century were due to long run stagnation in China combined with industrialization in Japan and Europe.
| Item Type: | Monograph (Working Paper) |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | http://www2.lse.ac.uk/economicHistory/workingPaper... |
| Additional Information: | © 2009 The authors |
| Divisions: | Economic History |
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions D History General and Old World > DS Asia |
| Date Deposited: | 11 May 2010 15:10 |
| Last Modified: | 13 Sep 2024 20:11 |
| URI: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/27871 |
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