Living Standards in the Past New Perspectives on Well-Being in Asia and Europe

When did Europe pull ahead of Asia in terms of living standards? A number of well-known scholars compare economic and demographic indicators of well-being in the pre-industrial period. The emerging picture is not one of great differences, but of considerable similarities in standard of living between Europe and Asia before the Industrial Revolution.

Robert Allen is Professor of Economic History at Oxford University and a fellow of Nuffield College. He received his doctorate from Harvard University. He has written extensively on English agricultural history, international competition in the steel industry, the extinction of whales, the global history of wages and prices, and contemporary policies on education. His articles have won the Cole Prize, the Redlich Prize, and the Explorations Prize. His books include Enclosure and the Yeoman: The Agricultural Development of the South Midlands, 1450-1850, which was awarded the Ranki Prize by the Economic History Association, and, most recently, Farm to Factory: A Re-interpretation of the Soviet Industrial Revolution. Professor Allen is a Fellow of the British Academy and the Royal Society of Canada. Tommy Bengtsson, Professor of Demography and Economic History at Lund University, works in both historical and contemporary economic demography. He has served in leading positions in Swedish and international organisations and is currently Chair of the IUSSP Committee on Historical Demography and Series Co-editor of the Eurasian Population and Family History Series. Martin Dribe is Associate Professor of Economic History at Lund University.