Wages, prices, and living standards in China, 1738–1925: in comparison with Europe, Japan, and India
2010/06/08 by Robert C. Allen, ROBERT C. ALLEN, JEAN‐PASCAL BASSINO +7 · 487 citations
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #Beijing #China #Culture, Economy, and Development Studies #Development economics #Economic history #Economics #Economy #Financial Crisis of the 21st Century #Geography #Historical Economic and Social Studies #Industrialisation #International trade #Labour economics #Market economy #Real wages #Standard of living #Wage #Western europe
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/j.1468-0289.2010.00515.x
published in The Economic History Review 64(s1), 8-38 (Wiley)
openalex publication_date 2010/06/08 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Abstract
This article develops data on the history of wages and prices in Beijing, Canton, and Suzhou/Shanghai in China from the eighteenth century to the twentieth, and compares them with leading cities in Europe, Japan, and India in terms of nominal wages, the cost of living, and the standard of living. In the eighteenth century, the real income of building workers in Asia was similar to that of workers in the backward parts of Europe but far behind that in the leading economies in north‐western Europe. Real wages stagnated in China in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and rose slowly in the late nineteenth and early twentieth, with little cumulative change for 200 years. The income disparities of the early twentieth century were due to long‐run stagnation in China combined with industrialization in Japan and Europe.
Cited by
- Household consumption patterns and the consumer price index, England, 1260–1869
- Wages, prices, and technology in early Catalan industrialization
- Technology and the great divergence: Global economic development since 1820
- Wages of Men, Women, and All the Others: Comparisons of the Standard of Living Based on Welfare Ratios Must Consider Household Complexity
- Weak data nullify bold claims about economic trends in Qing China
- From the Great Divergence to South–South Divergence: New comparative horizons in global economic history
- Stagnant Wages in the Ottoman State Textile Factories in the Nineteenth Century: Comparison with European Wages
- Economic trends in Qing China: A response to Rawski's bold claims
- Wages, prices and living standards in a growing economy. The case of Boston, Massachusetts
- Capitalism and extreme poverty: A global analysis of real wages, human height, and mortality since the long 16th century
- Chinese economic thought on population from the 1850s to 1950s: a Malthusian theme
- Smithian growth in the little divergence: a general equilibrium analysis
- Living standards and forced labour: A comparative study of colonial Africa, 1918–74
- The Power of Nations: Measuring What Matters
- Structural Impediments to African Growth? New Evidence from Real Wages in British Africa, 1880–1965
- Poverty and the Labor Market: Today and Yesterday
- The Social Implications of Sugar: Living Costs, Real Incomes and Inequality in Jamaica c1774
- Size and dynastic decline: The principal-agent problem in late imperial China, 1700–1850
- Japan in the Great Divergence Debate: The Quantitative Story
- A reassessment of the Great Divergence debate: towards a reconciliation of apparently distinct determinants
- Poverty or prosperity in northern India? New evidence on real wages, 1590s–1870s†
- From Divergence to Convergence: Reevaluating the History Behind China's Economic Boom
- The Monetary System of China under the Qing Dynasty
- Great Divergence [wikipedia]
Related