Grain Markets in Europe, 15001900: Integration and Deregulation (Cambridge Studies in Modern Economic History, Series Number 7)

In this 1999 book, Karl Gunnar Persson surveys a broad sweep of economic history, examining one of the most crucial markets - grain. His analysis allows him to draw more general lessons, for example that liberalization of markets was linked to political authoritarianism. Grain Markets in Europe traces the markets' early regulation, their poor performance and the frequent market failures. Price volatility caused by harvest shocks was of major concern for central and local government because of the unrest it caused. Regulation became obsolete when markets became more integrated and performed better through trade triggered by falling transport costs. Persson, a specialist in economic history, uses insights from development economics, explores contemporary economic thought on the advantages of free trade, and measures the extent of market integration using the latest econometric methods. Grain Markets in Europe will be of value to scholars and students in economic history, social history and agricultural and institutional economics. "Karl Gunnar Persson surveys a broad sweep of economic history, examining one of the most crucial markets - grain. His analysis allows him to draw more general lessons - for example, that liberalisation of markets was linked to political authoritarianism. Grain Markets in Europe, 1500-1900 traces early regulation to poor performance and frequent market failures. Price volatility caused by harvest shocks was of major concern for central and local government because of the unrest it caused. Regulation became obsolete when markets became more integrated and performed better through trade triggered by falling transport costs. Karl Gunnar Persson, a specialist in economic history, uses insights from development economics, explores contemporary economic thought on the advantages of free trade and measures the extent of market integration using state-of-the-art econometric methods. Grain Markets in Europe, 1500-1900 will be of value to scholars and students in economic history, social history and agricultural and institutional economics."--Jacket

Karl Persson surveys a broad sweep of economic history, examining one of the most crucial markets—grain—in order to demonstrate more general points. Grain Markets in Europe traces the markets' early regulation, their poor performance and the frequent market failures. Price volatility caused by harvest shocks was of major concern for central and local government because of the unrest it caused. Persson uses insights from development economics, explores contemporary economic thought on the advantages of free trade, and measures the extent of market integration using the latest econometric methods.

This is a modern economic and institutional history of European grain markets. This book examines the markets' early regulation, their poor performance and the frequent market failures. Using insights from development economics and econometrics, Persson also extracts general lessons from this survey of the grain trade