Labor market changes and social inclusiveness across regions: evidence from the rise of the modern office

Bublitz, Elisabeth; Wyrwich, Michael Article — Published Version Labor market changes and social inclusiveness across regions: evidence from the rise of the modern office The Annals of Regional Science Provided in Cooperation with: Springer Nature Suggested Citation: Bublitz, Elisabeth; Wyrwich, Michael (2023) : Labor market changes and social inclusiveness across regions: evidence from the rise of the modern office, The Annals of Regional Science, ISSN 1432-0592, Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, Vol. 72, Iss. 3, pp. 863-879, https://doi.org/10.1007/s00168-023-01225-2 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/317023 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen. Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may be saved and copied for your personal and scholarly purposes. You are not to copy documents for public or commercial purposes, to exhibit the documents publicly, to make them publicly available on the internet, or to distribute or otherwise use the documents in public. If the documents have been made available under an Open Content Licence (especially Creative Commons Licences), you may exercise further usage rights as specified in the indicated licence. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Vol.:(0123456789) The Annals of Regional Science (2024) 72:863–879 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00168-023-01225-2 1 3 ORIGINAL PAPER Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions: evidence fromtherise ofthemodern office ElisabethBublitz1· MichaelWyrwich2 Received: 14 March 2022 / Accepted: 10 May 2023 / Published online: 31 May 2023 © The Author(s) 2023 Abstract Could complex changes in the labor market reduce social inequalities across regions? We study the rise of office employment in the early twentieth century that was induced by innovations in office technology and organizational changes affecting the type of required office tasks. The new office jobs required little physical strength. We find that the regional employment share of industries that were strongly connected to the modern office, is positively linked to labor force participation of people with physical impairments. The positive employment effect is more visible for disabled men. In sum, the rise of the modern office that differed across regions started to lower labor market entry barriers and fostered social inclusiveness. JEL Classification J14· J23· O33· R11 1 Introduction In the context of inequality, the topic of more balanced growth is high on the policy agenda. In fact, whether interrelated economic, social, and technological changes can have a positive impact on social inclusiveness, decreasing inequality, has not only been of interest today (Kuznets, 1955; Lindert 2000; Hoffman etal. 2002; Piketty 2014; Lindert and Williamson 2016; Naudé and Nagler 2015, 2017). Already in 1893 Émile Durkheim (1984) wondered whether the structural transformation, as initiated during the industrial revolution, would challenge instead of fostering inclusiveness. To our knowledge, this question is still waiting for an answer. * Michael Wyrwich [email protected] Elisabeth Bublitz [email protected] 1 Universität Hamburg, Welckerstr. 8, 20354Hamburg, Germany 2 University ofGroningen, Nettelbosje 2, 9747,AEGroningen, TheNetherlands 864 E.Bublitz, M.Wyrwich 1 3 We understand diversity of the workforce as a measure of social inclusiveness. This can be captured by the accessibility to jobs, for instance, for vulnerable groups across regions. Thus, we address this topic by investigating the relationship between labor market changes and social inclusiveness of regional labor markets for people with disabilities. Unfortunately, today’s data are scarce and incomplete due to the sensitive information on disability status. Therefore, we refer to a unique historical regional dataset that informs us about labor market access of disabled people. In the early twentieth century, the rise of modern office work due to technological progress and organizational changes, which affected the type of required office tasks, revolutionized the job market. Office work became more routinized and accessible due to technological innovations (e.g., typewriter, cash register, mimeograph, Dictaphone, and stenotype) that reformed existing job tasks and lead to more standardized, less costly office work (Rotella 1981). The early twentieth century also saw a rise of modern industrial corporations (Chandler 1977) that needed office workers. Rotella (1981) brings forward two specific explanations for the rise of office employment. First, governments tightened regulatory requirements by demanding record keeping and tax reporting. Second, by implementing organizational changes like vertical integration or internationalization businesses increased their own need for documentation. The spread of office work increased the demand for jobs that make use of office technologies (e.g., accountants and stenotypists) and jobs related to the office organization like office and cash messengers, lift operators, or janitors. The rising demand for office work also increased labor force participation of population groups that had been underrepresented in non-domestic work in previous periods. So, for women there is a well-documented increase in labor supply due to the rise of the office sector (e.g., Costa 2000; Wyrwich 2019). Another group underrepresented in the labor market were disabled persons. There was an increasing awareness in the twentieth century that people with impairments were able and willing to work (Biesalski 1909) and the rise of office work should have enhanced their employment opportunities as well. The reason behind this conjecture is that factory (blue-collar) work in the early twentieth century required physical strengths that implied a lower employability of people with physical impairments. Contrary to that office work required little physical strength. Therefore people with physical impairments should have found it easier to take up employment in white-collar work relative to blue-collar work. We focus on the role of regional specialization in modern office jobs for labor force participation of people with disabilities. There is no evidence yet on the labor market integration of people with disabilities taking into account regional differences of this development. However, this is of great interest to gain a broader understanding of the interaction between technological progress and labor market participation for vulnerable groups across regions. Against this backdrop, we hypothesize that the rise of the modern office across regions positively relates to the labor force participation of people with disabilities of both men and women. In the empirical analysis, we exploit spatial variation in the size of office employment during the industrialization in the early twentieth century. We understand our work also as a motivating example, encouraging scholars to analyze the regional consequences of changes in the labor market for social inclusiveness—albeit potential data 865 1 3 Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions:… limitations. The chosen time period provides a historical setting to investigate how social inclusiveness could be achieved through market mechanisms, in the absence of a close-knit safety net. Put differently, the cultural and institutional environment of the industrialization entailed very difficult conditions for disabled individuals on the job search. We test our hypothesis with unique regional data from a full census on people with impairments which was conducted in the German Reich in 1925 (Reichsgebrechlichenzählung). The census has detailed regional information on demographic characteristics (including employment status and occupation) of all people with disabilities living in Germany and is merged with regional information on the industry and population structure in 1925 (Berufszählung). Our results confirm our conjecture. Via new employment opportunities, the labor share of people with impairments increased. At the same time, the overall share of workers with disabilities among all workers was not affected by the rise of the modern office. This suggests that people with disabilities did not benefit to a larger degree than other groups in the labor market back then. Our paper contributes to the literature on the spatial dimension of disability patterns. Previous research focused mostly on regional differences in the share of people with disabilities. McVicar (2006) documents huge spatial variation in the share of the population eligible for disability benefits when reviewing the empirical literature for the US and UK (see also Charles etal. 2018, for more recent evidence). This literature focuses on local labor market conditions and demographic factors to explain the regional share of disabled people but does not touch upon the economic behavior of this group. There is also work that exploits regional variation in disability insurance policies and how this affects claims (De Jong etal. 2011; Milligan and Shirle 2019) and labor force participation (Gruber 2000; Autor and Duggan 2003; Campolieti 2004; Kostol and Mogstad 2014). Although of general interest, there appears to be no study that investigates regional labor market participation of disabled people as a direct consequence of technological progress in regional industries. More generally, our research is also related to the literature on the role of technological progress for the (local) economy which is often focused on growth implications of technological relatedness (Frenken etal. 2007; Boschma and Iammarino 2009; Neffke etal. 2011), innovation (Crescenzi and Rodriguez-Pose 2011; Capello and Nijkamp 2019), and technology clusters (Kerr and Robert-Nicoud 2020). We contribute to the literature by shifting our attention to implications of fundamental labor market changes for economic and social inclusion at the regional level. To the best of our knowledge we are first in analyzing how such changes in the labor market contribute to the employment of people with disabilities. Inspiration was also drawn by a recent turn in economic geography that embraces historically informed research (Petralia et al. 2016; Fritsch and Wyrwich 2018; Mewes 2019; Schoenberger 2020; Allen and Donaldson 2020; Hanlon and Heblich 2020). In the spirit of Diamond and Robinson (2010), we see historical development as a mean to derive general implications that go beyond the historical context. For example, new opportunities to work from home due to digitalization reflect a modern example of how changes in the labor market foster social inclusiveness via the use of flexible work arrangements (e.g., home office) that have become possible due 866 E.Bublitz, M.Wyrwich 1 3 to ICT innovations that assist people with disabilities (European Parliament 2018). Today, regions specialized in industries where working from home is more widespread may offer people with disabilities better opportunities to participate in the labor market. Our work is also linked to regional approaches to understand the emergence of historical economic patterns (Becker etal. 2011; Gutberlet 2014; Mokyr 2017, 2018) and contributes to the literature on the socioeconomic impact of the industrial revolution that has been analyzed, for example, with respect to technological change (e.g., Rotella 1981; Atack 1985), the introduction of social insurance systems (e.g., Bauernschuster etal. 2017; Guinnane and Streb 2011, 2015; Fenge and Scheubel 2014), education (e.g., Ó Gráda 2016; Squicciarini and Voigtländer 2015; Goldin and Katz 2000), or the labor participation of women (e.g., Costa 2000; Rotella 1981); so far disregarding, however, the precarious situation of people with impairments. Other papers illustrate how job tasks relate to skills, as becomes evident in the context of computerization where medium-skilled individuals with routine tasks are more prone to lose their jobs than other skill groups (e.g., for computerization see Acemoglu and Autor 2011; Autor etal. 2003). These analyses have focused on changes in job tasks and their effect on standard qualification groups. We also focus on changes in job tasks but then look at the respective effects on workers depending on their health status. Our information on industries and occupational groups allows understanding potential benefits that arise from the interaction between new tasks (here technologies similar to today’s computerization) and skill types. Thus, we also contribute to the literature discussing mismatches between job demands and functional limitations (Baldwin and Chung 2014a, b; Kruse etal. 2018). 2 Empirical framework 2.1 Data sources The core dataset is the census on people with disabilities in the German Reich in 1925 (Reichsgebrechlichenzählung, Statistik des Deutschen Reichs 1929) that provides regional information on the demographic characteristics of all people with disabilities. The data were collected by trained census takers. The motivation for the survey was to have a statistical basis for public welfare and care policies. The data distinguish between different types of impairment out of which we look at blindness, deafness, deaf-muteness, weak and strong physical impairments.1 Disabilities are not self-reported but recorded by the trained census takers. Strong physical impairments were officially defined so as to include people with a permanent disability of limbs (e.g., deformation and amputation), joints (e.g., stiffness, luxation, and weakness), spine (e.g., deformation), and/or central and peripheral nervous system (e.g., paresis and paralyses), stemming either from congenital or trauma-related 1 We exclude mental illness because it is unclear to what degree this group could have benefitted from changes in office technologies. 867 1 3 Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions:… injuries. Less severe impairments were considered as weak impairments. Individuals should have benefitted in different ways depending on the impairment. For instance, compared to individuals with weak physical impairments, blind individuals faced greater obstacles when using a typewriter or cash register. However, individuals with stiff joints or an amputated leg/arm (classified as strong physical impairments) should have had less problems carrying out desk work. There is no information on the type of innovations in use. However, we check whether impairment categories benefitted to varying degrees from an increase in office employment. The information is available on the spatial level of 31 German states and Prussian provinces (for a list of regions, see (TableA1) in the online appendix). Information on the local share of office employment is based on data from the general employment census that was also conducted in 1925 (Berufszählung, see Statistik des Deutschen Reichs 1927). The two data sets are merged by region. This is a full census of the German population, comprising a stratification of employment by industry, occupation, and gender. We focus on manufacturing industries to identify office employees because, in-line with the historical background, it is reasonable to assume that white-collar employment in these industries reflects office jobs (for details, see Wyrwich 2019).2 In other industry sectors, such as hotels and restaurants, there should have been a higher share of non-office white-collar employment including, for instance, waiters, cooks, trade helpmates, and maids. Therefore, focusing on manufacturing industries should yield a cleaner measure of office employment than using all industries. Nevertheless, we agree that this measure is an approximation of the overall total employment because it could both overestimate (inclusion of nonoffice jobs within the white-collar numbers for manufacturing) and underestimate (exclusion of office jobs in service industries) the true extent of employment. There is only sparse information on the labor force participation of people with disabilities before the year 1925 to assess changes during the transformation of office work. At least, for the German state of Prussia, there are data from before the transformation of office work that we digitized. The data from 1880 stem from the Prussian Statistical Office (Preussische Statistik 1883). 2.2 Independent anddependent variables The main independent variable of interest is the regional number of white-collar employees in manufacturing industries over all employees. As argued above, this employment share indicates the regional employment share in office employment (LFPALL_OFFICE from Berufszählung). Our main dependent variable is the general labor force participation of disabled persons (LFP_TOTAL, from Reichsgebrechlichenzählung) in German regions. LFP_TOTAL is calculated by dividing the number of disabled employees by the number of all people with disabilities above the age of 14years by impairment type and gender. It is not possible to consider employment by age groups. The data from 2 Within the group of dependently employed people it is not possible to distinguish between office and non-office jobs. 868 E.Bublitz, M.Wyrwich 1 3 the census of disabled persons do not directly distinguish between office and factory employment as would be ideal for this analysis. Following our main argument, we expect that our measure for the prevalence of office workers LFPALL_OFFICE is positively related to LFP_TOTAL due to the outlined positive direct and indirect effects of the modern office on the labor market inclusion of disabled persons. There should be no or only a modest positive effect of factory employment on the share of disabled employees. In addition, we are interested in the share of disabled employees relative to the general labor force participation EMPS_ALL. The outcome variable of interest in this additional analysis is the share of disabled employees over all employees. Our analyses explore specific components of the modern office by disentangling two occupational channels of how the modern office could have affected labor force participation of people with disabilities. The outcome variables of interest are the share of people with disabilities in these occupations over all people with disabilities. First, we explore the employment share of people with disabilities in occupations that should have developed in conjunction with the office sector and that hold a supportive function (LFP_SUPPORTOFFICE). These jobs include office messengers, copyboys/girls, lift operators, office assistants, cash messengers, porters, file clerks, janitors and similar occupations. LFP_SUPPORTOFFICE includes mainly unskilled work and reflects a minor share of office-related jobs for people with disabilities. Second, we analyze the share of disabled employees in high-skilled occupations whose activities were primarily carried out in offices (LFP_SKILLOF- FICE). This group comprises (a) commercial employees (office and administrative staff) and (b) technical personnel (architects, engineers, technicians, draftsmen and plotters, laboratory assistants, etc.). The information on occupation is available for people with strong and weak impairments. A drawback of the variable LFP_SKIL- LOFFICE is that commercial employees and technical personnel could be assigned to specific industries but are not disentangled within these specific industries. Therefore, we could underestimate the effect of the office sector for this variable. A priori, it is unclear which group of the two groups benefitted more from the emergence of the modern office. Altogether, our models on occupational channels comprise a subset of office jobs with the advantage that these subsets capture office-related jobs very accurately. 2.3 Control variables We construct several control variables which are all based on the census on people with disabilities in the German Reich in 1925 (Sect.3.1) if not stated otherwise. As today, age determines the likelihood of taking up employment but also the likelihood of becoming impaired. We thus control for the age composition of disabled individuals. Our reference group is the share of people with disabilities aged between 20 and 40years. Additionally, we control for the age of impairment. More precisely, we include the share of people who became disabled when they were older 60 than years. We further add dummy variables for impairment, following the categorization of the data as outlined above. 869 1 3 Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions:… We control for the overall population share of people with disabilities. The analyses also include a gender dummy, indicating disabled women. It is further important to consider the share of people with disabilities receiving public annuities, namely pensions, accident insurance, and/or disability insurance, because this should be negatively related to incentives to take up employment (Maki 1993; Mullen and Staubli 2016) even though the payments were negligible.3 For selected groups of people with disabilities, we have information on the number of recipients of a specific welfare program for people with disabilities. The law on welfare for selected groups of people with disabilities, which was introduced in 1920 (Preußisches Gesetz betreffend die öffentliche Krüppelfürsorge), encouraged adolescents to take up employment. We consider the share of people receiving support in accordance with this law. Since only people with specific impairments could benefit from this program, we use this variable in a robustness check only.4 As many men were seriously injured during World War I, there were public policies to promote the reintegration of war veterans into the labor market. For example, in December 1922 there was a law that demanded to give preference to the war-disabled when hiring new employees (Gesetz über die Beschäftigung Schwerbeschädigter) (Bajohr 1976). Therefore, we control for regional differences in the share of male veterans with impairments. There were no female veterans. We introduce regional population density from the general employment census as of 1925 (for details, see Sect.3.1). Population density captures various differences in regional conditions (e.g., wages, amenities, and public infrastructure). To disentangle the effect of density from white-collar employment, which is typically concentrated in larger cities, only the variation in density that is not related to white-collar employment is considered.5 We also control for the size of regions with population size per region. Finally, we consider differences in the political climate of the 1920s. To this end, we take into account the vote shares of extreme right-wing parties in the general elections of 1924. Summary statistics and a correlation matrix can be found in (Table A2) and (TableA3) in the online appendix. The summary statistics show that there is a huge variation with respect to the employment rates of people with disabilities, ranging between 0 and 85%. The share of disabled employees among all employees is very low but reflects the general population share of people with disabilities, which is about 0.0017% on average. 3 The low level of annuities implied that receivers continued being active in the labor market (for details, see also Guinnane and Streb 2021). 4 This program was only available in the state of Prussia but not in other German states. Furthermore, information is available for weakly and strongly “fragile” persons because only these two groups were eligible. As only kids and adolescents who were not yet integrated in the labor market were eligible, the variable should nonetheless play no meaningful role. 5 To this end, the population density is regressed on the regional white-collar employment share. 870 E.Bublitz, M.Wyrwich 1 3 2.4 Estimation strategy To investigate our main hypothesis that the modern office increased labor market participation of disabled individuals, we run an OLS estimation with LFP_ TOTALr,d,g (labor force participation of disabled persons) as independent variable. Standard errors are clustered at the state level.6 The analysis is carried out by regions (r), impairment type (d), and gender (g), which implies that we calculate, for instance, the share of female employees who live in the region Berlin and are deaf. The number of observations is N = 309.7 The control variables shown in vector Zr,d,g were discussed above. As outlined before, it is likely that men and women were affected differently by the new office technologies. Therefore, we also run models where we interact all independent variables with a gender dummy assuming the value of one for women. We then replace the dependent variable LFP_TOTALr,d,g in Eqs. (1) and (2) with the employment share of people with disabilities among all employees ( EMPS_ALLr,d,g ) and the share of selected occupational groups ( SUPPORTOFFICEr,d,g,SKILLOFFICEr,d,g , for definitions, see previous section), keeping the rest of the equation the same. This way we can see whether occupations associated with modern offices experienced higher increases of employment for disabled individuals, which would support our arguments. 3 Results 3.1 The overall employment rate ofdisabled individuals An indicator for a potential effect of the rise of the modern office are changes in the employment shares of people with disabilities between the late nineteenth century and the early twentieth century. As mentioned, there is only sparse information on the labor force participation of people with disabilities before the transformation of office work. One exception is data on blinds and deaf-mutes from the year 1880 for the German state of Prussia, which covered two third of Germany’s territory back then. Comparing the labor force participation between 1880 and 1925 shows that this rate increased from 6.5 to 15% for women and from 34 to 39.5% for men. For (1) LFP_TOTALr , d , g=𝛽 1 LFPALL_OFFICEr+Zr , d , g+𝜀r , d , g (2) LFP_TOTAL r,d,g =𝛽 1 LFPALL_OFFICE r +𝛽 2 LFPALL_OFFICE r ∗ WOMEN r +Zr,d,g+Zr,d∗ WOMENr,d+𝜀r,d,g 6 For the state of Prussia, we cluster at the level of province because Prussia represented two thirds of the size of Germany in 1925. 7 N = 310 is the product of multiplying the number of regions with impairment type and gender (31 * 5 * 2). For one region one of the specific gender-impairment type combinations is not-existent, yielding 309 observations. 877 1 3 Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions:… Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at https:// doi. org/ 10. 1007/ s00168- 023- 01225-2. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http:// creat iveco mmons. org/ licen ses/ by/4. 0/. References Acemoglu D, Autor D (2011) Chapter12—Skills, tasks and technologies: implications for employment and earnings. In: Ashenfelter O, Card D (eds) Handbook of labor economics (Handbooks in Economics Part B), vol 4. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 1043–1171 Allen T, Donaldson D (2020) Persistence and path dependence in the spatial economy. NBER working paper no. 28059. National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA Atack J (1985) Industrial structure and the emergence of the modern industrial corporation. Explor Econ Hist EEH 22(1):29–52 Autor DH, Duggan MG (2003) The rise in the disability rolls and the decline in unemployment. Quart J Econ 118:157–205 Autor DH, Levy F, Murnane RJ (2003) The skill content of recent technological change: an empirical exploration. Quart J Econ 118(4):1279–1333 Bajohr S (1976) Die Hälfte der Fabrik. Geschichte der Frauenarbeit in Deutschland 1914 bis 1945, Verlag Arbeiterbewegung und Gesellschaftswissenschaft Baldwin ML, Chung C (2014a) Re-examining the models used to estimate disability-related wage discrimination. Appl Econ 46(12):1393–1408 Baldwin ML, Chung C (2014b) Wage discrimination against workers with sensory disabilities. Ind Relat J Econ Soc 53(1):101–124 Bauernschuster S, Driva A, Hornung E (2017) Bismarck’s health insurance and the mortality decline. In: CESifo working paper no. 6601 Becker SO, Hornung E, Woessmann L (2011) Education and catch-up in the industrial revolution. Am Econ J: Macroecon 3(3):92–126. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1257/ mac.3. 3. 92 Biesalski K (1909) Umfang und Art des jugendlichen Krüppeltums und der Krüppelfürsorge in Deutschland. Hamburg u, Leipzig Boschma R, Iammarino S (2009) Related variety, trade linkages, and regional growth in Italy. Econ Geogr 85:289–311 Campolieti M (2004) Disability insurance benefits and labor supply: some additional evidence. J Law Econ 22:863–889 Capello R, Nijkamp P (eds) (2019) Handbook of regional growth and development theories, 2nd edn. Elgar, Cheltenham Chandler AD (1977) The visible hand. The managerial revolution in American business. Belknap Press, Cambridge Charles KK, Li Y, Stephens M (2018) Disability benefit take-up and local labor market conditions. Rev Econ Stat 100:416–423 Costa DL (2000) From mill town to board room. The rise of women’s paid labor. J Econ Perspect 14(4):101–122. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1257/ jep. 14.4. 101 Crescenzi R, Rodriguez-Pose A (2011) Innovation and regional growth in the European Union. Springer, Heidelberg 878 E.Bublitz, M.Wyrwich 1 3 De Jong P, Lindeboom M, van der Klaauw B (2011) Screening disability insurance applications. J Eur Econ Assoc 9:106–129 Diamond J, Robinson JA (2010) Natural experiments of history. Harvard University Press, Belknap Press, Cambridge Durkheim É (1984) The division of labour in society (Contemporary Social Theory). Macmillan, Basingstoke European Parliament (2018) Assistive technologies for people with disabilities. In: In-depth analysis science and technology options assessment, PE 603.218, January 2018, EPRS—European Parliamentary Research Service Fenge R; Scheubel B (2014) Pensions and fertility: back to the roots. the introduction of Bismarck’s pension scheme and the European fertility decline. In Working paper no. 1734, September 2014, European Central Bank, Frankfurt Frenken K, van Oort F, Verburg T (2007) Related variety, unrelated variety and regional economic growth. Reg Stud 41:685–697 Fritsch M, Wyrwich M (2018) Regional knowledge, entrepreneurial culture and innovative start-ups over time and space—an empirical investigation. Small Bus Econ 51:337–353 Goldin C, Katz LF (2000) Education and income in the early twentieth century: evidence from the Prairies. J Econ Hist 60(3):782–818. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1017/ S0022 05070 00257 66 Gruber J (2000) Disability insurance benefits and labor supply. J Polit Econ 108:1162–1183 Guinnane TW, Streb J (2011) Moral hazard in a mutual health-insurance system: German Knappschaften, 1867–1914. J Econ Hist 71:10–104 Guinnane TW, Streb J (2015) Incentives that (could have) saved lives. Government Regulation of Accident Insurance Associations in Germany, 1884–1914. In J Econ Hist 75(04):1196–1227. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1017/ S0022 05071 50016 18 Guinnane TW, Streb J (2021) The Introduction of Bismarck’s social security system and its effects on marriage and fertility in Prussia. Population Dev Econ 47:749–780 Gutberlet T (2014) Mechanization and the spatial distribution of industries in the German Empire, 1875 to 1907. Econ Hist Rev 67(2):463–491 Hanlon WH, Heblich S (2020) History and urban economics. NBER working paper 27850. National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, MA Hoffman PT, Jacks DS, Levin PA, Lindert PH (2002) Real inequality in Europe since 1500. J Econ Hist 62:322–355 Kerr W, Robert-Nicoud F (2020) Tech clusters. J Econ Perspect 34:50–76 Kostol AR, Mogstad M (2014) How financial incentives induce disability insurance recipients to return to work. Am Econ Rev 104:624–655 Kruse D, Schur L, Rogers S, Ameri M (2018) Why do workers with disabilities earn less? Occupational job requirements and disability discrimination. Br J Ind Rel (forthcoming) Lindert PH, Williamson JG (2016) Unequal gains: American Growth and Inequality since 1700. Princeton University Press, Princeton, p 2016 Lindert PH (2000) Three centuries of inequality in Britain and America. In: Atkinson A, Bourguignon F (eds), Handbook of income distribution, vol 1, Elsevier Maki DR (1993) The economic implications of disability Insurance in Canada. J Law Econ 11(1):S148 McVicar D (2006) Why do disability benefit rolls vary between regions? A review of the evidence from the USA and the UK. Reg Stud 40:519–533 Mewes L (2019) Scaling of atypical knowledge combinations in American Metropolitan Areas from 1836 to 2010. Econ Geogr 95:341–361 Milligan K, Shirle T (2019) Push and pull: disability insurance, regional labor markets, and benefit generosity in Canada and the United States. J Law Econ 37:289–323 Mokyr J (2017) A culture of growth: the origins of the modern economy. Princeton University Press, Princeton Mokyr J (2018) Bottom-up or top-down? The origins of the industrial revolution. J Inst Econ 14:1003–1024 Mullen KJ, Staubli S (2016) Disability benefit generosity and labor force withdrawal. In: NBER working paper no. 22419, July 2016, National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge Naudé W, Nagler P (2015) Industrialisation, innovation, inclusion. In: Working paper no. 2015-043, October 2015, Department of Organisation and Strategy, Maastricht University Naudé W, Nagler P (2017) Technological innovation and inclusive growth in Germany. In: IZA Discussion paper no. 11194, December 2017, IZA Institute of Labor Economics 879 1 3 Labor market changes andsocial inclusiveness acrossregions:… Neffke F, Henning M, Boschma R (2011) How do regions diversify over time? Industry relatedness and the development of new growth paths in regions. Econ Geogr 87:237–265 Ó Gráda C (2016) Did science cause the industrial revolution? J Econ Lit 54(1):224–239. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1257/ jel. 54.1. 224 Petralia S, Balland P-A, Rigby DL (2016) Unveiling the geography of historical patents in the United States from 1836 to 1975. Sci Data 3:160074 Piketty T (2014) Capital in the twenty-first century. Belknap Press, Cambridge Preussische Statistik (1883) Die Gebrechlichen in der Bevölkerung des preussischen Staates nach den Ergebnissen der Volkszählung vom 1, December 1880. Verlag des Königlich Statistischen Bureaus, Berlin Rotella EJ (1981) The Transformation of the American Office: changes in employment and technology. J Econ Hist 41:51–57 Schoenberger E (2020) Roepke lecture in economic geography—war, capitalism, and the making and unmaking of economic geographies. Econ Geogr 96:1–22 Squicciarini MP, Voigtländer N (2015) Human capital and industrialization: evidence from the Age of Enlightenment. Quart J Econ. https:// doi. org/ 10. 1093/ qje/ qjv025 Statistik des Deutschen Reichs (1927) Volks, Berufs- und Betriebszaehlung vom 16 Juni 1925: Die berufliche und soziale Gliederung der Bevoelkerung in den Laendern und Landesteilen, vol 402–405. Reimar Hobbing, Berlin Statistik des Deutschen Reichs (1929) Die Reichsgebrechlichenzählung, vol 419. Reimar Hobbing, Berlin Wyrwich M (2019) Historical and current spatial differences in female labor force participation: evidence from Germany. Pap Reg Sci 98:211–239 Publisher’s Note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.