Book Chapter

Inequality in pre-industrial Luxembourg (1766-1842): comparing the effects of the end of feudalism in rural and urban areas

  • Sonia Schifano
  • Tiago Ferreira Flores
  • Antoine Paccoud

This paper uses the land distribution derived from the Maria Theresa cadastre in Luxembourg from 1766 and a land registry of 1842 to compare wealth inequality in Luxembourg City and Dudelange, a rural municipality in the south of the country. The Gini coefficients for the two areas show a big difference in inequality. In 1766, Dudelange, with a Gini coefficient of 0.84, seems to be much more unequal than Luxembourg City that registers a Gini coefficient on land distribution of 0.53. The inequality analysis in 1842 shows a reduction in the inequality estimates mainly driven by the abolishment of the feudal taxes and a reduction in the inequality gap between Luxembourg City and Dudelange. When looking at social mobility, however, the results for the two places are quite similar.

  • Keywords:
  • social mobility,
  • inequality,
  • Luxembourg,
  • pre-industrial,
  • wealth,
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Sonia Schifano

Bocconi University, Italy - ORCID: 0000-0001-8853-9067

Tiago Ferreira Flores

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research, Luxembourg

Antoine Paccoud

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research, Luxembourg

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  • Publication Year: 2025
  • Pages: 357-375
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
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  • Publication Year: 2025
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
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Chapter Information

Chapter Title

Inequality in pre-industrial Luxembourg (1766-1842): comparing the effects of the end of feudalism in rural and urban areas

Authors

Sonia Schifano, Tiago Ferreira Flores, Antoine Paccoud

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0667-9.17

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2025

Copyright Information

© 2025 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

La mobilità sociale nelle società preindustriali: tendenze, cause ed effetti (secc. XIII-XVIII) / Social mobility in pre-industrial societies: tendencies, causes and effects (13th-18th centuries)

Editors

Angela Orlandi

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

612

Publication Year

2025

Copyright Information

© 2025 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0667-9

ISBN Print

979-12-215-0666-2

eISBN (pdf)

979-12-215-0667-9

eISBN (xml)

979-12-215-0668-6

Series Title

Datini Studies in Economic History

Series ISSN

2975-1241

Series E-ISSN

2975-1195

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