EH.Net Abstracts in Economic History

                EHS Abstract Submission
                    (c) 1997 EH.Net
        -----------------------------------------------------------
              Name:  Peter Solar
               Email:  psolar at is1.ulb.ac.be
         Institution:  Free University of Brussels  

         Co-author:  None
 
             Title:  The Birth and Death of European Flax, Hemp,
and Jute Spinning Firms: The Irish and Belgian Cases  
 
 Internet Address
of abstracted work:  Not available on the Internet  
 
          By mail:  
                     Vesalius College
                     Vrije Universiteit Brussel
                     89 rue J-B Colyns
                     Brussels B-1050 Belgium  

          Language:  English
 
          Abstract:
   Why some firms die and others survive is only imperfectly
understood, although such knowledge would be of obvious use in
guiding policy toward small businesses and in explaining the
dynamics of industrialization.	In the last decade or so
economists have started to exploit large data sets to investigate
the determinants of firm survival and growth.  Among economic
historians there has been a boom in business history but little
systematic study of firm survival that would give a context to
the stories of the great firms.  This paper reports preliminary
results from a study of European flax, hemp, and jute spinners in
the nineteenth century. 

  Evidence on the births, deaths, and longevity of Irish and
Belgian spinners is presented.	Flax spinning firms turn out to
be quite long lived: contrary to the results of other historical
and contemporary studies, few firms disappear during the first
five years of their existence and a substantial share survive for
forty years or more.  This result may be due to characteristics
of the industry, notably its relatively high fixed capital costs,
or it may arise from the use of a variety of sources to track
firms making for greater accuracy than in previous studies.  

  The survival of individual firms is investigated using probit
analysis.  The results are largely negative: little of the
variation is explained, and the only variable that seems to
matter is the size of the firm.  It is difficult to attribute any
effects to the location of the firm, its age, its degree of
vertical integration, or its legal form.

 
      Bibliography:  Solar, Peter. "The Birth and Death of
European Flax, Hemp, and Jute Spinning Firms: The Irish and
Belgian Cases." Paper presented at the third World Congress of
Cliometrics, Munich, Germany, July 1997.
 
                  Subject:  B
 Geographical Area:  4
      Country/Region:  Ireland, Belgium
           Time Period:  7