Globalization and labor market integration in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Asia

Huff, G. and Caggiano, G. (2007) Globalization and labor market integration in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Asia. In: Wolcott, S. and Hanes, C. (eds.) Research in Economic History. Elsevier: Amsterdam, pp. 285-347. ISBN 9780762313709 (doi: 10.1016/S0363-3268(07)25006-2)

Abstract

This chapter uses new data sets to analyze labor market integration between 1882 and 1936 in an area of Asia stretching from South India to Southeastern China and encompassing the three Southeast Asian countries of Burma, Malaya, and Thailand. We find that by the late nineteenth century, globalization, of which a principal feature was the mass migration of Indians and Chinese to Southeast Asia, gave rise to both an integrated Asian labor market and a period of real wage convergence. Integration did not, however, extend beyond Asia to include core industrial countries. Asian and core areas, in contrast to globally integrated commodity markets, showed divergent trends in unskilled real wages.

• Item Type: Book Sections
• Status: Published
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Caggiano, Mr Giovanni
• Authors: Huff, G., and Caggiano, G.
• Subjects: H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
• College/School: College of Social Sciences > Adam Smith Business School > Economics
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISBN: 9780762313709