These are lists of regions and countries by their estimated realgross domestic product (GDP) per capita in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), the value of all final goods and services produced within a country/region in a given year divided by population size. GDP per capita dollar (international dollar) estimates here are derived from PPP estimates.
In the absence of sufficient data for nearly all economies until well into the 19th century, past GDP per capita often cannot be calculated, but only roughly estimated. A key notion in the whole process is that of subsistence, the income level which is necessary for sustaining one's life. Since pre-modern societies, by modern standards, were characterized by a very low degree of urbanization and a large majority of people working in the agricultural sector, economic historians prefer to express income in cereal units. To achieve comparability over space and time, these numbers are then converted into monetary units such as International Dollars, a step which leaves a relatively wide margin of interpretation.
According to Bairoch, in the mid-18th century, "the average standard of living in Europe was a little bit lower than that of the rest of the world."[2] He noted variations within both groups in 1750, citing the Asian civilizations of China and India as being the wealthiest among the Third World group, and Russia and Eastern/Southeastern Europe as being the poorest among the First World group.[3] He estimated that, in 1750, the average per-capita income of the East (Asia and Africa) was roughly equal to that of Western Europe, and that China's per-capita income was on-par with the leading European economies. He estimated that it was after 1800 that Western European per-capita income pulled ahead of the East.[4] China was still ahead in 1800; his GNP per capita estimates for 1800, in terms of 1960 dollars, are $228 for China ($1,007 in 1990 dollars) and $213 for Western Europe ($941 in 1990 dollars). But China fell behind not long after, falling to $204 ($901 in 1990 dollars) by 1860.[5]
1–2008 (Maddison)
The following estimates are taken exclusively from the 2007 monograph Contours of the World Economy, 1–2030 AD by the British economist Angus Maddison.[6]
Maddison's assumptions have been criticized and admired by academics and journalists.[7] Bryan Haig has characterized Maddison's figures for 19th century Australia as "inaccurate and irrelevant",[8] John Caldwell's assessed Maddison's arguments as having a "dangerous circularity",[9] and W. W. Rostow said "this excessive macroeconomic bias also causes him (Maddison) to mis-date, in my view, the beginning of what he calls the capitalist era at 1820 rather than, say, the mid-1780s."[10]
A number of economic historians have criticized Maddison's estimates for Asia. For example, W. J. MacPherson has described Maddison's work on India and Pakistan of using "dubious comparative data."[11]Paul Bairoch has criticized Maddison's work for underestimating the per-capita incomes of non-European regions, particularly in Asia, before the 19th century; according to Bairoch, per-capita income in Asia (especially China and India) was higher than in Europe prior to the 19th century.[12] Others such as Andre Gunder Frank, Robert A. Denemark, Kenneth Pomeranz and Amiya Kumar Bagchi have criticized Maddison for grossly underestimating per-capita income and GDP growth rates in Asia (again, mainly China and India) for the three centuries up to 1820, and for refusing to take into account contemporary research demonstrating significantly higher per-capita income and growth rates in Asia. According to Frank and Denemark, his per-capita income figures for Asia up to 1820 are not credible, go "against what we know from sources" and may need to be adjusted by a factor of two.[13] Maddison's estimates have also been critically reviewed and revised by the Italian economists Giovanni Federico[14] and Elio Lo Cascio/Paolo Malanima (see below).[15]
However, economist and journalist Evan Davis has praised Maddison's research by citing it as a "fantastic publication" and that it was "based on the detailed scholarship of the world expert on historical economic data Angus Maddison." He also added that "One shouldn't read the book in the belief the statistics are accurate to 12 decimal places."[16]
1–1800 (Maddison Project)
The Maddison Project is an international group of scholars who continue and build upon Maddison's work. In their 2020 report they concentrate on the pre-1820 period. Their revised figures show pre-industrial Europe to be richer, but its economic growth to be slower than previously thought.[17] This is consistent with Maddison's view that the income gap to Asia was already large before the Industrial Revolution.[17] The entirety of their GDP per capita estimates can be obtained from their online database.[18] The following data selection they present in their published paper:[17]
Economic historians: Angus Maddison; Stephen Broadberry; Hanhui Guan; David Daokui; Li Jutta Bolt; Robert Inklaar; Yi Xu; Zhihong Shi; Bas van Leeuwen; Yuping Ni; Zipeng Zhang; Ye Ma, have offered differing estimates of historic productivity in region, but show a similar trend of a decline between the beginning of the 17th and middle of the 20th centuries, before recovering:
Evolution of the GDP per capita for selected European countries between 1830 and 1890 according to Bairoch
The following estimates were made by the economic historian Paul Bairoch.[24] Unlike other estimates on this page, the GNP (PPP) per capita is given here in 1960 US dollars. Unlike Maddison, Bairoch allows for the fluctuation of borders, basing his estimates mostly on the historical boundaries at the given points in time.[25]
The following estimates are taken from a revision of Angus Maddison's numbers for Western Europe by the Italian economists Elio Lo Cascio and Paolo Malanima.[26] According to their calculations, the basic level of European GDP (PPP) per capita was historically higher, but its increase was less pronounced.
According to economic historian Prasannan Parthasarathi and Jeffrey G. Williamson earnings data from primary sources show that mid-late 18th-century real wages and living standards in Bengal sultanate (under the Nawabs of Bengal) a South Indian Kingdom of Mysore and Maratha Empire were higher than in Britain, which in turn had the highest living standards in Europe.[28][29] The economic historian Sashi Sivramkrishna estimates Mysore's average income for skilled laborers in the late 18th century to be five times higher than subsistence leval[30] Parthasarathi also slates the real wage decline occurred in the early 19th century, or possibly beginning in the very late 18th century, under British rule.[28][29][31]
Economic historiansAngus Maddison,[32]Stephen Broadberry, Johann Custodis, Bishnupriya Gupta,[33] Jutta Bolt, Robert Inklaar, Herman de Jong and Jan Luiten van Zanden[19] have offered differing estimates of historic productivity in region, but show a similar trend of a decline between the beginning of the 17th and middle of the 19th centuries, before recovering:
According to economic historian Jean Batou, Ottoman Egypt's average per-capita income in 1800 was comparable to that of leading Western European countries such as France, and higher than the overall average income of Europe and Japan.[35] Barou estimated that, in terms of 1960 US dollars, Egypt in 1800 had a per-capita income of $232 ($1,025 in 1990 dollars). In comparison, per-capita income in terms of 1960 dollars for France in 1800 was $240 ($1,060 in 1990 dollars), for Eastern Europe in 1800 was $177 ($782 in 1990 dollars), and for Japan in 1800 was $180 ($795 in 1990 dollars).[36][37]
Much of the recent work in estimating past GDP per capita has been done in the study of the Roman economy, following the pioneering studies by Keith Hopkins (1980) and Raymond Goldsmith (1984).[38] The estimates by Peter Temin, Angus Maddison, Branko Milanovic and Peter Fibiger Bang follow the basic method established by Goldsmith, varying mainly only in their set of initial numbers; these are then stepped up to estimations of the expenditure checked by those on the income side. Walter Scheidel/Steven Friesen determine GDP per capita on the relationship between certain significant economic indicators which were historically found to be plausible; two independent control assumptions provide the upper and lower limit of the probable size of the Roman GDP per capita.[39]
Italia is considered the richest region, due to tax transfers from the provinces and the concentration of elite income in the heartland; its GDP per capita is estimated at having been around 40%[47] to 66%[48] higher than in the rest of the empire.
The GDP per capita of the Byzantine Empire, the continuation of the Roman Empire in the east, has been estimated by the World Bank economist Branko Milanovic to range between $680 and 770 (in 1990 International Dollars) at its peak around 1000 AD, the reign of Basil II.[49] This is 1.7 times the subsistence level as compared to the slightly higher value of 2.1 for the Roman Empire under Augustus (30 BC–14 AD).[50]
1 2 3 4 5 Bolt, Jutta; Luiten van Zanden, Jan (2020). "Maddison Project Database 2020". University of Groningen. 1990 to 2011 International $ 1:1.72. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
1 2 Harding, Enopoletus (2018-07-19). "Understanding and reconciling the two real GDP series in Maddison Project 2018". Medium. Retrieved 2021-04-26. The Maddison Project has thus made the unusual decision to produce two GDP series. One series (rgdpnapc) is purely within-country, with the international price comparisons being done only once (2011). The other (cgdppc) coerces the GDP data to fit every international price comparison the Maddison Project has on record, no matter how ridiculous
1 2 3 The border between "Western Europe" and "Eastern Europe" as defined by Bairoch corresponds to the iron curtain, with "Eastern Europe" being identical to the Eastern Bloc (Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Romania, Poland, and the USSR plus Albania). All the rest of Europe makes up "Western Europe" (Bairoch 1976, pp. 317, 319).
↑ Maddison, Angus (6 December 2007). Contours of the world economy, 1–2030 AD: essays in macro-economic history. Oxford University Press. p.379. ISBN978-0-19-922720-4.
↑ Scheidel, Walter; Morris, Ian; Saller, Richard, eds. (2007): The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco-Roman World, Cambridge University Press, ISBN978-0-521-78053-7
↑ Milanovic 2006, p. 459. This latter value also forms the basis for the only superficially lower $633 given by Milanovic et al. 2007 in the table above. The difference in the Roman and Byzantine GDP (PPP) per capita is due to the authors operating with differing conversion rates for the subsistence level: $300 in the Roman case (2.1 x $300 = ~$633), $400 in the Byzantine one (1.7 x $400 = $680). This means that Roman GDP (PPP) per capita was around 20% higher than the Byzantine one.
Bibliography
GDP per capita of the Roman Empire
Bang, Peter Fibiger (2008): The Roman Bazaar: A Comparative Study of Trade and Markets in a Tributary Empire, Cambridge University Press, ISBN0-521-85532-2, pp.86–91
Goldsmith, Raymond W. (1984): "An Estimate of the Size and Structure of the National Product of the Early Roman Empire", Review of Income and Wealth, Vol. 30, No. 3, pp.263–288
Temin, Peter (2006): "Estimating GDP in the Early Roman Empire", Lo Cascio, Elio (ed.): Innovazione tecnica e progresso economico nel mondo romano, Edipuglia, Bari, ISBN978-88-7228-405-6, pp.31–54
GDP per capita of the Byzantine Empire
Milanovic, Branko (2006): "An Estimate of Average Income and Inequality in Byzantium around Year 1000", Review of Income and Wealth, Vol. 52, No. 3, pp.449–470
European GDP per capita
Bairoch, Paul (1976): "Europe's Gross National Product: 1800–1975", Journal of European Economic History, Vol. 5, pp.273–340
Angus Maddison — reviews and revisions
Maddison, Angus (2006): The World Economy. A Millennial Perspective (Vol. 1). Historical Statistics (Vol. 2), OECD, ISBN92-64-02261-9
Maddison, Angus (2007): "Contours of the World Economy, 1–2030 AD. Essays in Macro-Economic History", Oxford University Press, ISBN978-0-19-922721-1, p.382, table A.7.
Federico, Giovanni (2002): "The World Economy 0–2000 AD: A Review Article", European Review of Economic History, Vol. 6, No. 1, pp.111–120 — review
Lo Cascio, Elio; Malanima, Paolo (Dec. 2009): "GDP in Pre-Modern Agrarian Economies (1–1820 AD). A Revision of the Estimates", Rivista di storia economica, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp.391–420 — critique of Maddison's estimates
Bolt, Jutta; Van Zanden, Jan Luiten (2014): "The Maddison Project: Collaborative Research on Historical National Accounts", The Economic History Review, Vol. 67, No. 3, pp.627–651
External links
Maddison Project — Estimates of economic growth between AD 1 and 2010
India was one of the richest countries in the world, for about two and a half millennia starting around the end of 1st millennium BC and ending around the beginning of British rule in India.
The study of the economies of the ancient city-state of Rome and its empire during the Republican and Imperial periods remains highly speculative. There are no surviving records of business and government accounts, such as detailed reports of tax revenues, and few literary sources regarding economic activity. Instead, the study of this ancient economy is today mainly based on the surviving archeological and literary evidence that allow researchers to form conjectures based on comparisons with other more recent pre-industrial economies.
This is the Economic history of the Indian subcontinent. It includes the economic timeline of the region, from the ancient era to the present, and briefly summarizes the data presented in the Economic history of India and List of regions by past GDP (PPP) articles.
The World Economy: Historical Statistics is a landmark book by Angus Maddison. Published in 2004 by the OECD Development Centre, it studies the growth of populations and economies across the centuries: not just the world economy as it is now, but how it was in the past.
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Certain historical time periods have been named "golden ages", where development flourished, including on the Indian subcontinent.
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Angus Maddison was a distinguished British economist specialising in quantitative macro economic history, including the measurement and analysis of economic growth and development.
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Papyrus evidence from Roman Egypt suggests like other more recent and thus better documented pre-modern societies, the Roman Empire experienced high infant mortality, a low marriage age, and high fertility within marriage. Perhaps half of the Roman subjects died by the age of 10. Of those still alive at age 10, half would die by the age of 50.
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The Maddison Project, also known as the Maddison Historical Statistics Project, is a project to collate historical economic statistics, such as GDP, GDP per capita, and labor productivity.
The economy in the Indian Subcontinent during the Mughal Empire era performed just as it did in ancient times, though now it would face the stress of extensive regional tensions. It was described as large and prosperous. India producing about 28% of the world's industrial output up until the 18th century. While at the start of 17th century, the economic expansion within Mughal territories become the largest and surpassed Qing dynasty and Europe, where from Bengal Subah alone, the province statistically has contributed to 12% of Gross domestic product. by 1700s, Mughals had approximately 24 percent share of world's economy. They grew from 22.7% in 1600, which at the end of 16th century, has surpassed China to become the world's largest GDP.
The economy of South Asia comprises 2 billion people living in eight countries. The Indian subcontinent was historically one of the richest regions in the world, comprising 25% of world GDP as recently as 1700, but experienced significant de-industrialisation and a doubling of extreme poverty during the colonial era of the late 18th to mid-20th century. In the post-colonial era, South Asia has grown significantly, with India advancing because of economic liberalisation from the 1980s onwards, and extreme poverty now below 15% in the region. South Asia has been the fastest-growing region of the world since 2014.
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