DP12909 Ancestral characteristics of modern populations

Author(s):	Paola Giuliano, Nathan Nunn
Publication Date:	May 2018
Keyword(s):	cultural traits, Historical development, Persistence, Political Institutions
JEL(s):	N00, Z10, Z13
Programme Areas:	Labour Economics, Development Economics, Economic History
Link to this Page:	cepr.org/active/publications/discussion_papers/dp.php?dpno=12909

We construct a database, with global coverage, that provides measures of the cultural and environmental characteristics of the pre-industrial ancestors of the world's current populations. In this paper, we describe the construction of the database, including the underlying data, the procedure to produce the estimates, and the structure of the final data. We then provide illustrations of some of the variation in the data and provide an illustration of how the data can be used.