look at population density in the year fifteen hundred as a measure of success white population density well for one thing it may be easier to measure than real wages but also consider in earlier times the world may have been in some kind of now losing an ecuadorian that is if a country or region was doing well that would mean that more people would exist but it wouldn't necessarily mean higher real wages so for looking at population density in the year fifteen hundred is very important predictor of that is a variable called years since agricultural transition namely how long ago did that region make the transition to regular settled agriculture another way of putting this is that having had a head start many years earlier still seems to be making a difference another predictor of early economic development mainly population density in the year fifteen hundred is a variable called state history for how long has the region had a history of a well-developed centralized state what's pictured here by the way if the salisbury cathedral in england which is home to one of the original copies of the magna carta another important paper in this literature is by common easterly and gone and they asked the question in their title was the wealth of nations determined in one thousand bc they find some fairly startling results one is that technology adoption in the year fifteen hundred predicts prosperity today and the level of technology today fairly well they find even that technology adoption in the year one thousand bc has some explanatory power for technology and technology adoption and prosperity today this is again suggesting that the idea of a head start really matters the papers in this literature also find that what matters most is not the current geography of a country but rather the geography of the country where the settlers came from for instance pictured here is new zealand a lot of the settlers of new zealand came from england but predicts the economic prosperity of new zealand is not necessarily the current geography of new zealand but rather the older geography of the settlers of new zealand mainly the english this is again reflecting the theme of the distant past really matter these results are all intriguing but it's much harder to know what to make of them in particular which forces channel these early effects does it have to do fundamentally with culture for instance wants a nation or region has a successful culture the success may have some matter perpetuate itself over time that tends to be my preferred explanation other writers have considered the possible role of genetics in creating persistence and prosperity over time we may end up considering that an entirely separate video could it be some other factor for instance if your region was doing well early on that gave you a source of political advantage which then perhaps was used to take resources from others which would both help you and to some extent keep them down maybe so but in any case this all the way too much further investigation just to repeat archaea reading here it's an article called how deep are the roots of economic development in addition to the other pieces mentioned i'd also recommend chandan other men early starts reversals and catch up in the process uh... economic development