That would predict Germany being much richer than Austria-Hungary or Britain being much richer than Sweden, or Spain being much richer than Italy. Industrialisation led to enormous power imbalances that made colonisation possible. Northwest Europe was pulling away from the rest of Europe starting in the 1300s.
> This ‘Little Divergence’ is the process whereby the North Sea Area (the UK and the Low Countries) developed into the most prosperous and dynamic part of the Continent. Studies of real wages – the classic paper is by Robert Allen (2001) – and of GDP per capita (e.g. Broadberry et al 2011, Van Zanden and Van Leeuwen 2012, Alvarez-Nogal and Prados de la Escosura 2012) charting the various trajectories of the European countries in detail, demonstrated that the Low Countries and England witnessed almost continuous growth between the 14th and the 18th century, whereas in other parts of the continent real incomes went down in the long run (Italy and Spain), or stagnated at best (Portugal, Germany, Sweden and Poland). This ‘Little Divergence’ is also quite clear from data on levels of urbanization (De Vries 1981), book production and consumption (Buringh and Van Zanden 2009) and agricultural productivity (Slicher van Bath 1963a, Allen 2000).
> This ‘Little Divergence’ is the process whereby the North Sea Area (the UK and the Low Countries) developed into the most prosperous and dynamic part of the Continent. Studies of real wages – the classic paper is by Robert Allen (2001) – and of GDP per capita (e.g. Broadberry et al 2011, Van Zanden and Van Leeuwen 2012, Alvarez-Nogal and Prados de la Escosura 2012) charting the various trajectories of the European countries in detail, demonstrated that the Low Countries and England witnessed almost continuous growth between the 14th and the 18th century, whereas in other parts of the continent real incomes went down in the long run (Italy and Spain), or stagnated at best (Portugal, Germany, Sweden and Poland). This ‘Little Divergence’ is also quite clear from data on levels of urbanization (De Vries 1981), book production and consumption (Buringh and Van Zanden 2009) and agricultural productivity (Slicher van Bath 1963a, Allen 2000).
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