J.W. Drukker, Delft University of Technology
Vincent Tassenaar, University of Groningen

This paper is a first attempt to investigate whether the 'early industrial growth puzzle' also applies to the case of The Netherlands in the first half of the 19th century. This puzzle refers to the -at first sight rather contradictory- findings of declining heights, at times when real income per capita must have been rising, first reported by Margo and Steckel (1983), while later on, several other, quite similar cases were collected and discussed by Komlos (1994a; 1994b), and Steckel (1995a), among others. A first attempt to explain the early industrial growth puzzle by applying some standard economic theory, was presented by Komlos in 1996 (Komlos 1996a). In our paper, we follow broadly speaking KomlosŐ line of reasoning, investigating whether the suggested explaining patterns can also be found in the data for The Netherlands. The main conclusions of the paper are as follows: 1. The case of The Netherlands during the first half of the 19th century constitutes another fine example of the 'early industrial growth puzzle', that can be added safely to the list; 2. Regional differentiation suggests that the decline in the biological standard of living was dominated by a worsening of the 'modern' urbanized areas of Holland, and that the economically backward, 'rural-traditional' regions were least affected, which is completely consistent with Komlos' explanation; 3. Data on regional mortality-rates corroborate the development of regional height differentials; 4. It is shown that price developments after 1825 were indeed contributing to the worsening of the material conditions of the common people, especially those who were living in the cities, which is also in line with Komlos' explanation; 5. The most puzzling point however, seems to be that all evidence points into the direction that Dutch economic growth in the first half of the 19th century was concentrated in modern agriculture, not industry. This last point seems to contradict completely Komlos' explanation.