Saving Data: The Canadian Regional Historical Wealth Microdata Collection

 

As an economic historian, much of my work involved the collection and analysis of individual level and regional wealth data from late 19^th and early 20^th century central Canada.  This work began in the 1980s with my thesis on wealth in Wentworth County under Peter George at McMaster and became a long term career project that used probate and census data to look at the determinants of Canadian wealth holding as well as its distribution.  After 30 years, the responsible thing to do was to try and find a home for the data and in this regard I am delighted to announce that after conversations with Sara Janes at the Lakehead University Library Archives, a home has been found for the data collection and it has migrated so to speak.  While the full electronic access to the data files is still in progress, the collection now has an entry point.  A fuller description of the data set is available at the Archives site.

 

The data in the Canadian Regional Historical Micro Data Collection consists of over 12,000 probated decedents in Ontario and Manitoba for the period spanning approximately 1870 to 1930.  In terms of the components housed at the Lakehead University Library and Archives, there are:

 

1)    Canadian Historical Regional Micro-Data Collection: Survey Sheets: Approximately 12,000 estate files recorded on 3 to 5-page survey sheets (8” by 11”) comprising approximately 25 linear feet of material.

2)    Canadian Historical Regional Micro-Data Collection: E-Files: 11 sets of e-files in excel format with accompanying coding information, approximately 30 MB of data.

3)    Canadian Historical Regional Micro-Data Collection: Microfilm Resources: Several boxes of microfilm of estate files for Ontario in 1892 and 1902 and the Thunder Bay District, 1885 to 1930. Note that these will become part of the Northern Studies Resource Centre collection of the Paterson Library.

 

 

The work involving data collection and research has occurred over more than 30 years starting in the late 1980s with thesis research for a PhD in Economics at McMaster University, Hamilton and then occupying the bulk of an academic career at Lakehead University.  Along with the SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship that funded the PhD (1986-1990) and the collection of the original Wentworth County estate files, there were three additional SSHRC Standard Research Grants (1991-94; 1999-02 and 2007-10) which helped put together the rest of the data. 

 

The historical probate wealth micro data was collected for four regional areas: they are Wentworth County, Ontario (1872-1927), Thunder Bay District, Ontario (1885-1927), Ontario (1892, 1902) and Manitoba (1873-1927).  Along with over 12,000 estate files collected in hard copy survey sheets which are now housed in the Lakehead University Archives, there are electronic data sets that have been generated that will eventually be available through hyperlinks through the provincial Permafrost digital data preservation system.  Much of the wealth and asset information as well as personal information on the survey sheets has been placed in Excel spread sheets.  Variables include gender, occupation age at death, wealth, portfolio composition, religious affiliation, birthplace, etc…However, there was substantial anecdotal and personal information taken down as well as details on bequests and estate division that was never coded and inputted and is still available in the paper-based survey forms.  There is still research that can be done by coding and inputting the estate division details and subsequently analyzing it.  While some preliminary work was done with Wentworth County in this regard and available for Wentworth County 1872 to 1892, funding for this last stage never materialized and remains undiscovered country. These decedents are also a potential resource for anyone doing genealogical research.

 

So, this is a preliminary message. When the data links are fully up and running, I will do another post.  Until then, if there are questions about accessing the collection including the electronic data in advance of full hyperlink access, they can be directed to Sara Janes at the Lakehead University Archives [sjanes1@lakeheadu.ca (807) 343-8272].  Again, my thanks to the Lakehead University Archives for helping preserve this data for future research work.

 

 

 

Wealth and Debt Accumulation in Early Financial Markets Stockholm Conference

I had the privilege of attending along with nearly 50 other participants  the "Wealth and Debt Accumulation in Early Financial Markets" conference that was held at the Stockholm School of Economics September 13-14.  The conference was organized by Elise Dermineur (Umea University/Stockholm School of Economics) and Håkan Lindgren (Stockholm School of Economics) who are both affiliated with the EHFF Institute for Economics and Business History Research at the Stockholm School. The conference united researchers working with a variety of historic sources of data on credit, wealth and debt but with very strong representation from probate inventories - an area that I have spent nearly thirty years working with.  

 

Conference attendees were welcomed by Lars Strannegard, the President of the Stockholm School of Economcs and keynote addresses were by Carole Shammas (USC)  titled "Why Did Finance Professionalize" and Phil Hoffman (CIT) titled "Dark Matter Credit".  Along with paper sessions, there were also two round tables.  On the Thursday, there was "The 'Market' as a Concept" which was moderated by Kristina Lilja (Uppsala) and the Friday afternoon saw "Women and Early Financial Markets" moderated by Ann McCants (MIT).  The conference wrapped by with a discussion and plans for future collaborative international research moderated by Anders Perlinge (Stockholm School of Economics).  

It was a lively, well organized and well attended conference with a lot of participation and interaction.  It was frankly rewarding to see so many researchers working in areas similar or parallel to mine and with similar types of data.  The strong resource base provided by Swedish probate records was particularly impressive and it is due to the hard work and initiative of Swedish researchers as well as generous research support.  The research into probate inventories as well as support for the conference comes from the Handelsbanken Research Foundation, the Wallenburg Economic History Foundation, the Marcus Wallenburg Foundation for International Scientific Collaboration, the Jacob Wallenburg Foundation, the Ebbe Kock Foundation, the Gunvar and Josef Aner Foundation, and the Swedish Foundation for Humanities and Social Sciences.  

Let me conclude with a warm thank you to our hosts and research supporters or as they would say in Sweden - tack så mycket - and end with a few pictures from the conference.

 

Wealth Inequality in the North Atlantic Anglosphere

I have been working on historical wealth and wealth inequality for most of my career and have put together a lot of my thinking and long-term analysis together in one spot - a new book published by Palgrave MacMillan in their Pivot series.  The ebook edition was released several days ago and is available on the Palgrave site.  The hard cover version should be available at the end of June or early July. If you want a short overview of the book, I put together a post for the Palgrave Exploring Economic History Blog that provides a nice summary of the book and some of its main ideas. An excerpt from the blog:

"Before 1750, wealth inequality was higher in the United Kingdom than the United States, but American inequality grew rapidly to match the United Kingdom by mid-nineteenth century. The preindustrial period was marked by lower wealth inequality in both the United States and the United Kingdom. The subsequent era of industrialization is marked in all three Anglosphere countries by rising wealth inequality. Wealth inequality declined in the twentieth century with redistribution away from the top one and ten percent. The decline in wealth inequality halted in the 1970s but with a rebound in American wealth inequality.
For the United Kingdom, the top 1 percent wealth share rose from an average of 25 percent in the pre-1850 period to 64 percent for the 1850 to 1900 period. More remarkably, the average share of wealth held by the top ten percent of the wealth distribution in the second half of the nineteenth century was just over 90 percent in the United Kingdom, approximately 72 percent in the United States and about 56 percent in Canada. By the early 21st century, Canada and the United Kingdom have their top ten percent with approximately 50 percent of wealth and the United States over 70 percent. Meanwhile the top one percent own just under 20 percent in Canada and the United Kingdom while in the United States the share is closer to 35 percent.
The twentieth century mitigation of wealth inequality correlates with several factors: rates of economic growth closer to the rate of return on capital, increased unionization rates, rising public spending on health and education, larger public sectors, increased home ownership rates, the onset of substantial estate taxation, more progressive income tax systems and in the case of the United Kingdom a housing policy that resulted in the disposition and dispersion of much public housing into private hands. A reduction in the strength of unions as measured by unionization rates as well as the end of estate taxation and less progressive income tax systems is associated with more economic inequality since the 1970s especially combined with lower economic growth rates relative to the return to capital."

You can also get quite a few bits of the book on Google Books if you want a free preview.   The book surveys the evolution of wealth inequality as measured by the Gini Coefficient and the wealth shares of the top 1% and top 10% for Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom.  A quick sample of one of the figures below on the wealth share of the top 1 percent in the United States from 1774 to 2012.

 

Anyway, it has been great working with Palgrave MacMillan and its staff in putting this project together and seeing it through.  Am glad to see the book out.