On the eve of the Great Famine (1846–50) Irish incomes were low by west European standards. However, an analysis of Irish diets at the time suggests that poverty was mitigated by a calorific intake that exceeded that of early nineteenth-century England and France. The added physical requirements of farm work in Ireland were not commensurate. The impression of healthy food is corroborated by a comparative analysis of Irish and British heights in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

Although only recently the positive performance of the landlords in the Spanish agricultural growth has been standed up, we know relatively little about the participation of the landed aristocraty in these changes. Through the analysis of the administation, the accounting, investments and strategies of some aristocratic families, the article emphasizes the slowness and very often failure of some transformations. The work shows that nor mental factors neither the scarcity of resources and opportunities explain these failures. Instead it is pointed out their incapacity in creating an efficient organization which could solve, at die same time, the problems of a scattered inheritance and the ambiguities of formal property rights.

Devaluations were traditionally considered to be expansionary in the short run and have no real long-run effects. Alternatively, some observers in developing countries found that devaluations were contractionary on impact, and that they might foster long-term growth. Using Argentina as a case study, which is convenient due to its long series availability and its subsequent switches in exchange rate regimes, four structural shocks are identified in line with the traditional and alternative views. It is found that devaluations were mostly contractionary, and that real long-run effects were only possible when inflation was either low or moderate. In light of the estimates, a historical revision of Argentinean devaluation episodes from 1854 to 2018 has been carried out.

The influence of economic ideas in parliamentary debates has attracted increasing attention in the analysis of the institutionalisation of political economy in the liberal age in the Western world. Within this framework, this paper explores a particular case: the relevance of economic ideas and the role of economists in the debates that took place in the Spanish Parliament in 1869 following the bill issued by the Minister of Finance Figuerola to establish a tax on personal incomes. Economic ideas and parliamentarian economists played a significant role in the design of the income tax as a key tool to modernise Spain's tax system, and in the subsequent parliamentary discussions.

The literature on internationalisation processes in family businesses has boomed with the emergence of new approaches and different perspectives. One of these schemes analyses the so-called born-again global firms, mostly technology companies, which experienced an internationalisation process after one or more serious incidents affecting it. The case of Ines Rosales extends the frontier of the meaning of a global born-again firm to firms in industries and traditional products. One of its most striking aspects is that the flagship product is centennial and based on basic ingredients. In addition, the production process of the firm mix production by hand and mechanised developments. Inés Rosales shows the ability of a family Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) in a process of internationalisation even in culturally distant markets through the traditional cake of olive oil.

This paper analyses the role of Mompox in New Granada's interregional trade during the late colonial period. It focuses on the value, structure and destination of exports of domestic goods from Mompox to markets on the Atlantic and the Andes. By unearthing unexplored sources, this paper provides evidence that will help to understand, indirectly, some issues such as the nature and timing of economic growth, the degree of regional specialisation and, above all, the role of inland ports in the economic geography of the viceroyalty. The paper contends, first, that the region experienced a boom–bust cycle during the late colonial period. The export of domestic goods doubled between 1770 and 1800 but subsequently collapsed during the 1802-1809 years. Second, evidence suggests that the region experienced a process of market deepening and widening. Trade flows, then, played a larger role in shaping the economic history of the region than previously thought.

This note is a first aproximation to the evolution of wages in a catalan cotton firm. From the firm sources it has been made a male and female wages indexes. The main conclusions are the relative wage stability up World War I, the change in die evolution from die war, the sexual diferentiation of wages and the different evolution between bodi indexes.

La interpretación tradicional de la agricultura española considera que durante medio siglo antes de la guerra civil hubo pocos cambios en la productividad de los factores de producción. Además, la falta de cambios en la agricultura se ha considerado muchas veces, junto con los bajos niveles de vida de muchos productores y una demanda doméstica insuficiente para estimular la producción industrial, como un círculo vicioso del «estancamiento agrícola». Las causas principales de la baja productividad en el sector agrario han sido atribuidas a problemas estructurales, como el latifundio y el minifundio, y a los inadecuados métodos de cultivo, resultado de inversiones de capital insuficientes.

Los cambios que tuvieron lugar en las economías de los países occidentales desde los últimos años del siglo xix hasta el primer tercio del xx han venido asimilándose por la literatura reciente a la aceleración de la productividad de los factores producida por la rápida incorporación de nuevas tecnologías y cambios en los sistemas de organización de las empresas. Una de las principales nuevas tecnologías que contribuyeron a esta aceleración fue la incorporación y rápida expansión de la electricidad en el proceso productivo.

The degree of development of Spanish agriculture at the end of the XIX century and the beginning of XX is a controversial issue. In this respect the study of the integration of the domestic market could provide new evidence since the degree of the market integration can be considered an indicator of economic development. By using regional wheat prices this paper analyzes the Spanish market integration between 1891 and 1905. With this aim in mind we employ the usual cointegration approach as well as an alternative method based on spectral analysis that allows taking into consideration the existence of no synchronized cycles.

El objetivo de la presente comunicación consiste en precisar los diversos modos en que el agua, recurso económico fundamental, resultó afectada por el proceso de modernización que implicaba la labor revolucionaria antifeudal del siglo xix y las consecuencias que de ello se derivaron. Para conseguir esta meta será necesario definir brevemente el régimen feudal de propiedad de las aguas y justificar el significado del neologismo despatrimonialización, que me he tomado la libertad de acuñar. Trazo general de las soluciones que dio la revolución liberal a los problemas de las formas de propiedad típicas del antiguo régimen es su carácter negativo, es decir, la eliminación de los factores que la hacían inmovilizada, amortizada o.vinculada. Como la tierra, tampoco las aguas tenían, en la etapa de predominio del sistema feudal, la condición de bienes libres de propiedad particular. El mencionado carácter negativo está en la base, incluso en su misma construcción gramatical, de los términos castellanos desamortización y desvinculación. Esta es una de las razones por las que me he decidido a emplear, en el caso del agua, el término despatrimonialización. He elegido también, y principalmente, esta expresión porque integra muy bien, en su parte positiva, las distintas situaciones que se dan respecto de la propiedad del agua en la sociedad feudal.

No sé si el lector de esta polémica habrá obtenido alguna satisfacción intelectual de su lectura. Confío, eso sí, que habrá podido valorar la validez de los datos y argumentos de una y otro. Reconozco que la respuesta de Antolín a mis objeciones me ha producido una cierta perplejidad. Contiene, en primer lugar, buen número de consideraciones —algunas de ellas interesantes— que nada tienen que ver con las objeciones que yo planteaba. Cuando se centra en ellas cae, a mi entender, en cierta incoherencia o, simplemente, elude presentar una réplica sólida. A fin de no aburrir más al inocente lector voy a presentar tan sólo tres puntualizaciones sobre los puntos en discordia y dos breves comentarios de alcance más amplio.

We present the yearly evolution of the Spanish income velocity of money (M2) and we explain its behavior from 1850 to 2000. The Spanish income velocity of money displays a downward trend until 1973 and shows the expected U-shaped pattern at the end of the twentieth century. An international comparison shows how the Spanish trend change occurs with a lag due to the late industrialization. We estimate the determinants of the velocity—the inverse of the demand for money—for the period 1850–1997. A cointegration analysis and an error correction model investigate the importance of the institutional variables in explaining the long-run behavior of the income velocity of money in Spain. The findings reveal a greater stability in the long-run velocity model when the institutional variables are considered.

This work focuses on the origins of the Fierro Group. Ildefonso Fierro (1882–1961) was one of the most prominent businessmen of Franco's regime. Fierro's case study presents two features that distinguish it from other Spanish family firms founded in the first half of the twentieth century: its high degree of diversifcation and its peculiar financial history. Prior to the commencement of the Franco dictatorship, Fierro had managed to form a diversifed family business and had bought a bank to finance his industrial activity. This article analyzes how he achieved this and compares his path with that of the Japanese Zaibatsu.

This article examines Argentine relations with multilateral agencies and bankers during the first years of the last military dictatorship. It begins with an overview of relations and the external situation before the rise of the military and why a new economic team sought and restored Argentine credit standing. There follows a review of how links with the U.S. Treasury and international institutions lost significance and how cross-country financial intermediation, carried out mainly by leading state banks, gave foreign bankers a key role in the financing of Argentina’s foreign exchange needs. It also emphasises explicit and underlying motivations in the behaviour and policies of all actors involved and offers an evaluation of former Minister Martínez de Hoz’s efforts to justify these policies in the early 1980s.

Diversas investigaciones sobre el Banco de España nos han permitido conocer la evolución de sus activos y pasivos, las vicisitudes de su vinculación con el Tesoro, su expansión por provincias o la favorable cotización de sus acciones, pero no sabemos quiénes eran los que se veían principalmente beneficiados por esto último, es decir, nos es prácticamente desconocido el nombre de los mayores accionistas, por más que haya referencias como la que encabeza este artículo, de lo bien que les iba a tales accionistas; otros contemporáneos se atrevieron a recargar aún más las tintas o a cuantificar suculentos beneficios.

El análisis de una cuestión tan importante como es la evolución del poder adquisitivo de los trabajadores durante el período franquista tropieza con graves dificultades debido a la inexistencia de series estadísticas continuas y suficientemente fiables acerca de los niveles salariales prevalecientes en dichos años. El Instituto Nacional de Estadística (INE) no inició hasta 1963 la elaboración de una Encuesta de Salarios dirigida a establecimientos seleccionados por muestreo aleatorio. Aunque la nueva encuesta tenía una cobertura limi tada y adolecía de diversos problemas metodológicos (Serrano y Malo de Molina, 1979: 331–346; Lorente, 1982), supuso una mejora muy importante respecto a la situación anterior en que la única información oficial disponible se limitó a unos datos de ganancias obtenidos por el INE desde 1953, que constituyen el precedente inmediato de la Encuesta de Salarios mencionada, y unos datos de «tarifas salariales» publicados por el mismo Instituto.

La Economía Política se incorporó como tal disciplina a los Planes de Estudios de la Universidad española a partir de la Real Cédula de 12 de julio de 1807 (Reforma Caballero), que la incluyó en el noveno año de la Facultad de Leyes. A partir de entonces, con distintas denominaciones, pero-casi siempre con la de Economía Política, esta disciplina ha figurado siempre en los Planes de Estudios de la Universidad española, con la única excepción del decenio absolutista 1824–1833, en el que la Economía se consideró como una «ciencia peligrosa para los jóvenes».

This article considers the importance of sugar in the Cuban economy in the first twelve years after the Revolution. Two major emphases in policy can be identified. From 1959 the revolutionary leaders attempted to diversify away from sugar, but with only limited success. By 1970 the failure of this policy was evident and a second approach, which placed sugar in the forefront of economy policy, was introduced.

In this paper we revive an old explanation for Gresham's law that rests on the trafficking of coins by moneychangers. Focusing on the late Middle Ages, we present material suggesting that moneychangers used their private information on money to make profit through billonnage and arbitrage operations. In both cases their activity led to the partial –sometimes total– disappearance of the undervalued coins.