Gender (in)equality, maritime economies, and numeracy development in Greece during the 19th and 20th centuries

Abstract

We study the history of human capital in Greece during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We investigate the numeracy skills of the population both at national and regional levels. Furthermore, we test the effect of gender equality, as well as geographic, demographic and socio-economic factors such as agricultural specialisation (crops, livestock), trade and industry development, urbanisation, and migration on numeracy. We find that in Greece the gender gap is highly correlated with numeracy and its effect fades out around 1910. We show that maritime orientation of the island economies was highly complementary with early numerical human capital and increasing gender equality.