Devotion and Development: Religiosity, Education, and Economic Progress in Nineteenth-Century France
American Economic Review · 2020 · Volume 110 · Issue 11
Abstract
This paper studies when religion can hamper diffusion of knowledge and economic development, and through which mechanism. I examine Catholicism in France during the Second Industrial Revolution (1870–1914). In this period, technology became skill-intensive, leading to the introduction of technical education in primary schools. I find that more religious locations had lower economic development after 1870. Schooling appears to be the key mechanism: more religious areas saw a slower adoption of the technical curriculum and a push for religious education. In turn, religious education was negatively associated with industrial development 10 to 15 years later, when schoolchildren entered the labor market.
Keywords
Search, Learning, Information and Knowledge, Communication, Belief, Unawareness, Analysis of Education, Returns to Education, Economic History: Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy: Europe: Pre-1913, Cultural Economics: Religion
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