Published April 1993
| public
Journal Article
Credit Markets and Economic Change in Southeastern France 1630-1788
- Creators
- Rosenthal, Jean-Laurent
Abstract
This paper analyzes a sample of loan contracts from a town in southeastern France between 1630 and 1788. The data suggest that credit markets were both active and flexible. Prior to 1750, a wide range of interest rates was charged to different borrowers for perpetual annuities. Interest rates and size of loan were highly correlated with social ranking. After 1750, financial innovation led lenders to charge 5 percent on nearly all perpetual annuities. The market grew significantly between 1700 and 1789 because intermediaries were able to adapt short-term credit contracts to serve a larger and larger segment of the population.
Additional Information
© 1993 Academic Press. This research was supported in part by the Department of Economics and the International Studies and Overseas Program at UCLA. I thank Lance Davis, Eric Engen, Philip Hoffman, Gilles Postel-Vinay, Paula Scott, Ken Sokoloff, and Michael Waldman for helpful suggestions. This article was presented in seinars at Illinois, Michigan, Northwestern, UCLA, and Stanford; I thank the participants for their comments.Additional details
- Eprint ID
- 65210
- DOI
- 10.1006/exeh.1993.1006
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20160308-134641643
- UCLA
- Created
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2016-03-10Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-10Created from EPrint's last_modified field