Using cross-country differences in the degree of isolation before the advent of technologies in sea and air transportation, we assess the relationship between geographical isolation and financial development across the globe. We find that prehistoric geographical isolation has been beneficial to development because it has contributed to contemporary cross-country differences in financial intermediary development. The relationship is robust to alternative samples, different estimation techniques, outliers and varying conditioning information sets. The established positive relationship between geographical isolation and financial intermediary development does not significantly extend to stock market development.

Introductions of nonindigenous organisms into the United States have been linked to international trade. The individual contributions of imports, immigration, and international travel, however, are poorly understood because introduction dates are unavailable. We examine relationships between economic trends and discoveries of nonindegenous insects and use these relationships to infer the timing and determinants of introductions. We find that a few variables can explain much variation in species introductions and identifications. The most significant contributor to the introduction appears to be agricultural imports. Currently available proxies for academic effort are weak determinants of the probability that introduced species are identified.

This article examines the marketing and distribution of foreign fabric, predominantly English, in the northern sub-plateau of Spain at the beginning of the 18th century using information from a fiscal source. The official tax record used in this study was a specific and special tax levied on cloth imported from countries with which Spain was at war. The details of this tax shed more light on a hotly debated topic with respect to transport and networks in modern Spain and make it possible to analyze and quantify the physical volume as well as the value and the destination of textiles.

This article examines Britain's temporary import surcharge introduced in October 1964, a largely overlooked but significant dimension of the 1964 sterling crisis. Import surcharges (temporary supplementary tariff) were illegal under GATT rules and aroused fury among trading partners. Britain's surcharge is placed in context by consideration of the use of import surcharges by other countries under Bretton Woods as currency crisis management and balance of payments measures, notably Canada's import surcharge of 1962–3 that inspired Britain's. Developed by the Conservative administration from 1963, a 15 per cent surcharge was introduced by the newly elected Wilson government as a radical alternative to deflation or devaluation to help correct the record balance of payments deficit and meet the gathering sterling crisis. As a currency crisis management measure the surcharge worked in Canada but in Britain it made matters worse and was soon supplanted by conventional measures. Deemed a failure and discredited, the surcharge was eventually lifted in November 1966 ‘unwept, unhonoured and unsung’ (Financial Times). Nevertheless, while in place the surcharge provided significant temporary assistance to the improvement of Britain's balance of payments.