Institute for Research on Poverty Seminar

Jeffrey G. Williamson, Harvard University, presents a paper that asks, Is inequality largely the result of the Industrial Revolution? Were pre-industrial incomes as unequal as they are today? This paper infers inequality for 29 ancient, pre-industrial societies using what are known as social tables, stretching from the Roman Empire 14 AD, to Byzantium in 1000, to England in 1688, to Nueva España around 1790, to China in 1880 and to British India in 1947.