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The British Historian John Hiden once called pre-WWI Latvia "the Belgium of the East" due to its highly advanced manufacturing, serving the Russian market. The independent Latvian nation-state (1918–1940) lost this status together with the industrial equipment, evacuated in 1915–1916 to mainland Russia and never returned. Inter-war Latvia did attempt to "Denmarkize", i.e., to become an internationally important exporter of food and to re-industrialize. Both its economic success and growth performance are severely contested. According to Roses and Wolf (in: Broadberry S, O'Rourke KH (eds) The Cambridge economic history of modern Europe, vol 2. 1870 to the present. Cambridge UP, Cambridge, pp 183–207, 2010), Latvia's GDP per capita growth rate was the highest among the European countries in 1929–1938. According to the most authoritative expatriate Latvian account by Aizsilnieks (Latvijas saimniecības vēsture, 1914–1945. Daugava, Stockholm, 1968), the growth stagnated in the years of the authoritarian Karlis Ulmanis regime (1934–1940). Roses and Wolf estimates are indirect. Aizsilnieks grounds his conclusions in the methodologically outdated national income estimates from inter-war times. This paper resolves the controversy by providing direct supply-side time series of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 1920–1939, based on a benchmark estimate of Latvia's GDP in 1935 by Norkus et al. (Cliometrica, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11698-022-00260-x, 2022). Main findings: The economic growth continued after 1934, but it was not Europe´s top growth performer in 1929–1938. However, in 1922–1938, its growth performance was the best, also due to a very low baseline after the extreme war-related economic destruction. The "Denmarkization" process was only partially successful because agricultural productivity remained low, and the re-industrialization was mainly import-substitution. We also did find that since 1936, Latvia's GDP per capita grew with substantial stagnation of the sectoral share of agriculture and a re-shift from services to manufacturing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper for the first time calculates the historical regional GDP (rGDP) for an Eastern European country by using the methodology of Frank Geary and Tom Stark [2002. Examining Ireland's post-famine economic growth performance. The Economic Journal, 112(482):919–935]. The estimates cover the period 1925–1935 and are made for the historical Latvian regions Kurzeme, Vidzeme, Zemgale, Latgale, and Riga as well as within the contemporary NUTS3 units. The results are compared with the GDP disparity of the NUTS3 regions of the restored independent Latvia (2001–2016). The main findings are that the sigma divergence remained stable. Direct comparisons of regional growth rates indicate that economically more advanced regions were more sensitive to business cycles than less advanced regions. Hence, sigma divergence seems to prevail in times of high growth and convergence in times of low growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is the first comparative analysis of mortality transition, as part of the demographic transition, in all the three Baltic countries during the interwar period. We address the following research questions: Which type of mortality transition is exemplified by the interwar Baltic countries' mortality patterns? Was the mortality transition completed already before WWII? What were Baltic cross-country differences in the advancement of mortality and demographic transitions? We present and use newly constructed life tables for Lithuania, 1925–1934, and draw on the work of the Estonian demographer Kalev Katus (1955–2008), publishing for the first time his life tables for Latvia in 1925–1938. Main findings: The three countries were part of the Western model of mortality transition. However, the reduction of infant and childhood mortality was lagging in Lithuania. Women of childbearing age in Estonia and mainland Latvia, as a result of earlier fertility decline, experienced longer life expectancy due to the decreased mortality from birth complications. Nevertheless, in all three countries mortality transition was still incomplete by WWII. A comparison of death causes in 1925–1939 serves to corroborate the last conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents a new combined annual cost of living and consumer price index for Norway covering 1492–2018, indicating that Norwegian price history has to be revised. The new historical price index is constructed on a significantly richer data material, which also makes it cover a longer period of price history than the existing one. This is made possible by the compilation of quantitative data from numerous sources, mostly originating from the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, with grain prices stretching back to 1492. The new combined cost of living and consumer price index is constructed by a Laspeyres approach with shifting baskets for commodities and expenditure groups. The index makes it possible to follow annual inflation and deflation in Norway for a period of 526 years. When comparing to existing indices, the new series reveals that revisions are needed in Norwegian price history. These make the historical price development more in line with those of the neighbouring countries and more in line with the pattern of wholesale prices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the basis of a novel dataset, the article investigates the anatomy of financial crises in Norway from 1830 to 2010. First, nine significant crises are identified. Second, the article examines spillover effects on the real economy. We find a clear but not symmetric relationship. Third, the article investigates key patterns in credit and money volumes. Major financial crises typically occurred after substantial money and credit expansion, causing financial instability. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

By utilizing data from one of the largest international historical archives on wages and prices, this article offers new nominal and real wage series for Norway, 1726-2006. These serve as measures for the purchasing power of labour as input to production. The new series cover all main industries and thereby enables solid conclusions. The new series challenge existing views on the development of the purchasing power of labour in Norway during the last three centuries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various reports within the issue including A Tale of Two Peripheries: Real Wages in Denmark and New Zealand 1875-1939, by David Greasley and A Price Earnings Index for the Danish Stock Market, Ole Risager.