Discussion paper

DP14261 Cognition, Culture, and State Capacity: Age-Heaping in XIX Century Italy

We re-examine the causes and interpretation of age-heaping in a case study of nineteenth century Italy. Italian census data allow us to calculate age-heaping measures by province, education, gender, and marital status. Our results validate the use of age-heaping as a proxy for human capital, but also reveal anomalies difficult to reconcile with a pure numeracy interpretation. Alongside individual cognitive ability, the census data clearly suggest a role for contextual factors in shaping age-heaping patterns. Direct evidence from Italian social and political history buttresses the case for culture and state capacity as determinants of age-heaping. Age-heaping and illiteracy are well correlated because both are reflections of an underlying process of modernisation, a process which, in nineteenth century Italy, was slow and incomplete.

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Citation

A'Hearn, B, A Delfino and A Nuvolari (2019), ‘DP14261 Cognition, Culture, and State Capacity: Age-Heaping in XIX Century Italy‘, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 14261. CEPR Press, Paris & London. https://cepr.org/publications/dp14261