EH.Net Abstracts in Economic History

                ABSTRACTS IN ECONOMIC HISTORY
                     (c) 2002 EH.Net
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Name:  Jeffrey G. Williamson
Email:  jwilliam at kuznets.fas.harvard.edu
Institution:  Harvard University

Co-author:  Kevin H. O'Rourke
Department of Economics and IIIS
Trinity College
Dublin 2, Ireland
E-mail: Kevin.orourke at tcd.ie

Title:  After Columbus: Explaining Europe's Overseas Trade Boom, 1500-1800

Internet Address of abstracted work:  not available

By mail:
Department of Economics
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138

Language:  English

Abstract:
This study documents the boom in Europe's imports from Asia and the 
Americas between 1500 and 1800 and explores its causes. There was no 
commodity-price convergence between continents, suggesting that 
declining trade barriers were not the cause of the boom. Thus, it 
must have been caused by some combination of European import demand 
and foreign export supply. The behavior of the relative price of 
foreign importables in European cities should tell us which mattered 
most and when: we provide the evidence and offer a model which is 
used to decompose the sources of Europe's overseas trade boom.

Bibliography: Williamson, Jeffrey G. and Kevin H. O'Rourke. "After 
Columbus: Explaining Europe's Overseas Trade Boom, 1500-1800." The 
Journal of Economic History 62, no. 2, June 2002: 417-456.

Subject:  S
Geographical Area:  4
Country/Region:
Time Period:  0

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