Publications

Published research

2025, Epidemics and urban growth: the impact of cholera in Nineteenth-century Prussia. The History of the Family. (With Kalle Kappner) [link]

2025, Introduction to the Special Issue ‘Development and inequality: A long-run view’. The Journal of Economic Surveys, 39(2) [link]

  • Available in Open Access Form (here).

2025, The global sanitary revolution in historical perspective. The Journal of Economic Surveys, 39(2), 567-598 [link]

  • Available as working paper at the websites of CEPR (here) and EHES (here).
  • See a summary of this research at VoxEU (here).

2025, Book Review of A history of plague in Java, 1911-1942 by Maurits Bastiaan Meerwijk. Maurits Bastiaan Meerwijk [link]

2024, Water, Politics, and Disease: The Diffusion of Water Supply Infrastructure in Urban Germany, 1850-1913. Journal of Urban History [link]

2023, Capital, Productivity, and Human Welfare since 1870. Forthcoming in the The Handbook of Cliometrics [link]

  • Available in Open Access form (here).
  • Available as working paper at the websites of CEPR (here) and EHES (here).

2023, Book review of Human Development and the Path to Freedom: 1870 to the present By Leandro Prados Escosura. Economic History Review [link]

2022, The Demographic Effects of Colonialism: Forced Labor and Mortality in Java, 1834-1879. Journal of Economic History, 82 (1), 211-249. (with Pim de Zwart and Auke Rijpma) [link]

  • Runner-up (2nd position) for the University Fund Wageningen Research Award in 2022.
  • See a summary of this research at VoxEU (here) and Long-Run Health Matters (here).
  • See article news about this research in Dutch by NRC , Trouw and RD. News in English can be found at WUR news.
  • See data and replication files, here.

2022, Book review of The Mismeasure of Progress: Economic Growth and Its Critics by Stephen J. Macekura. EH.net [link]

2022, Growth or stagnation? Well-being during the Spanish industrialization in Alcoy (1860-1910). Investigaciones de Historia Económica / Economic History Research, 18 (1), 26-37. (with José Joaquín García Gómez) [link]

  • This article was the Editors’ Choice of Investigaciones de Historia Económica / Economic History Research (see Twitter Thread on this here).
  • Part of this research featured a post in Nada es Gratis, an economics blog in Spanish (see here).

2021, The role of capital and productivity in accounting for income differences since 1913. Journal of Economic Surveys, 35 (3), 952-974. (with Robert C. Inklaar) [link]

  • A replication package can be found here.
  • See a summary of this research at VOX, the online portal of the CEPR, here.
  • See a podcast episode by A Correction Podcast featuring this paper, here.

2021, A bitter epidemic: The impact of the 1918 influenza on sugar production in Java. Economics & Human Biology, 42. (with Pim de Zwart) [link]

  • You can find the data for this article in an article published by Data in Brief, here.

2021, Review of the book Landscapes of Disease: Malaria in Modern Greece, by Katerina Gardikas. Technology and Culture 62 (1), 280-281. [link]

2021, Optimism or pessimism? A composite view on English living standards during the Industrial Revolution. European Review of Economic History, 25 (1), 1-19. (with Herman de Jong) [link].

  • See the working paper version here.
  • See a summary of this research at VOX, the online portal of the CEPR, here. A more updated summary can be found at Long-Run Health Matters, here.
  • This research featured a post in Nada es Gratis, an economics blog in Spanish (see here).

2020, Sanitary infrastructures and the decline of mortality in Germany, 1877-1913. The Economic History Review, 73 (3), 730-757. [link]

  • This piece also appeared in a special issue about bringing epidemics under control, published by the Economic History Review, here.
  • See the working paper version here.
  • See a post at the Economic History Society Blog (The Long Run) here.

2019, The Composition of Capital and Cross-country Productivity Comparisons. International Productivity Monitor, 36, 34-52 (with Robert. C. Inklaar and Pieter J. Woltjer). [link]

2019, Missed opportunities? Human welfare in Western Europe and the United States, 1913–1950. Explorations in Economic History, 72, 57-73. [link]

  • See the working paper versions here and here.
  • The data and code can be found at the Open ICPSR data repository, click here.

2018, Health, well-being and inequality over the long term. Doctoral dissertation at the University of Groningen.

  • You can download the thesis here.
  • See media summaries by the University of Groningen (link) and Scientia (link).

2018, Health and economic development since 1900. Economics & Human Biology,31, 228-237. [link]

2015, Paving the way to modernity: Prussian roads and grain market integration in Westphalia, 1821–1855. Scandinavian Economic History Review, 63 (1), 69-92 (with Martin Uebele). [link]

  • See the working paper version here.
  • See a blog post at the European Historical Economics Society Blog (Positive Check) here.