[ger] Die rasante Zunahme der Ungleichheiten, die in den meisten Industrieländern seit 25 Jahren zu beobachten ist, muss in einem längerfristigen Kontext gesehen wird. In Frankreich ist das Lohngefälle im 20. Jahrhundert insgesamt stabil geblieben, während die Vermögensungleichheiten...

The TRA project is a unique research approach based on the nationwide collection of historical individual-level data on the personal, occupational and economic situation of people having married or died between the early nineteenth century and the mid-twentieth century. Coinciding with the...

[eng] The Welfare State is generally thought to transfer resources from young and future generations to old ones. This opinion, however, is based on a narrow view of the transfer system that focuses on pensions and elderly-care programs. Our paper shows that taking downward educational transfers...

[fre] À partir d'informations comptables et de dossiers bancaires relatifs à un échantillon de PME ayant déposé leur bilan entre novembre 1988 et janvier 1993, on étudie les comportements de l'entreprise en difficulté et de ses créanciers durant la période qui sépare le défaut de...

[spa] Estructura del capital y costes de informaciôn : el caso de las empresas francesas a finales de los ochenta . La estructura de financiaciôn de una empresa es el resultado de un arbitraje entre los costes de los diferentes recursos : autofinanciaciôn, deudas o emisiones de acciones....

[eng] Ever since the controversies on blue-collar workers’ pensions in the mid-nineteenth century, the capacity of individuals to provide their own old-age insurance has been debated. Yesterday, workers were stigmatized for their improvidence and denied all pension rights; today, there are...

This paper provides estimates of the long-term effects on height and health of a large income shock experienced in early childhood. Phylloxera, an insect that attacks the roots of grape vines, destroyed 40% of French vineyards between 1863 and 1890, causing major income losses among wine growing...

Poorly developed financial markets are widely believed to block economic growth, because only modern financial intermediaries such as banks can mobilize large amounts of financial capital at low cost. This claim is supported by cross country regressions, but the regressions assume that credit...

We divide decedents into two groups: “rentiers" (whose wealth is smaller than the capitalized value of their inherited wealth) and “savers” (who consumed less than their labor income). Applying this split to a unique micro data set on inheritance and matrimonial property regimes, we find...

In the 1860's in France, firms often stopped their production in summer. This paper tests the hypothesis that it can be partially explained by worker mobility between industry and agriculture during summer. Formally, labour supply is modelled as an arbitrage by workers between the two types of...