Cover and Pecorino (2005) demonstrate, using monthly NBER reference dates, that, the March 1933 departure from the gold standard is the most probable breakpoint ushering in an era of longer expansions, both absolutely and relative to recessions that follow. Cover and Pecorino view this finding...

Why are some constitutions amended frequently and others hardly at all? An obvious candidate determinant is constitutional rigidity, i.e., the size and number of procedural barriers to amendment. Given some demand for amendment, greater rigidity implies a smaller supply. However, measures of...

The US time structure of production during the 2002 through 2009 business cycle is characterized empirically using industry-level input-output data. An industry’s total industry output requirement (TIOR) is proposed as a metric for "roundaboutness". I find that the time structure of production...

We use Comparative Constitutions Project (CCP) data to explore whether Constitutions that follow revolutions are designed differently. We employ matching methods using 31 treatments (revolutionary Constitutions) and 162 control units (new Constitutional adoptions without a revolution). We find...

Julius Caesar and Cornelius Tacitus provide characterizations of early Germanic (barbarian) society around, respectively, 50 BC and 50 AD. The earlier date corresponds to expansion of Rome to the Rhine and Danube. During the subsequent century Germanic governance institutions changed in a number...

Conventional wisdom suggests that small businesses are innovative engines of Schumpetarian growth. However, as small businesses, they are likely to face credit rationing in financial markets. If true then policies that promote lending to small businesses may yield substantial economy-wide...

We consider a neoclassical growth model where labor collectively chooses the labor share to maximize its steady-state wage rate. If the labor share increases relative to the competitive share, labor captures a larger share of a smaller total income. At a higher labor share the incentives to...

Robert Solow (1958) argued that, from 1929-1954, U.S. aggregate labor's share was not stable relative to what we would expect given individual industry labor's shares. I confirm and extend this result using data from 1958-1996 that includes 35 industries (roughly 2-digit SIC level) and spans the...

Medieval monarchs in Western Europe responded to financial and military pressures by instituting representative assemblies. Three estates (classes; orders) were represented in these assemblies: clergy, nobility, and burghers. In the late medieval and early modern periods, some states tended...

We explore the relationship between union density and labor shares using panel data on 35 industries, spanning the entire US economy, for the years 1983 through 2005. For the full sample, a standard deviation increase in union membership rates is associated with an increase in an industry’s...