The literature on development has pointed out
some deeply-rooted determinants of current economic development. Most
research on the field has been devoted to developing countries or
specific to single countries. We focus on deeply-rooted determinants of
development of European regions, in particular on the influence of human
capital. Following an identification strategy using instrumental variables, we approach the historical links between current human
capital and the presence of universities and trade guilds in medieval
times. We show that human capital is an important determinant of
income disparities across European regions, and that trade guilds and
universities at 1500 are good instruments to track the exogenous
influence of the current levels of human capital. This finding shows
robustness to several econometric specifications.
Development, regions, historical determinants of development.
