Standard of Living Effects Due to Infrastructure Improvements in the 19th Century

We use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to analyze the relationship between the biological standard of living and the development of the transport network in 90 municipalities located in the rural provinces of Groningen and Drenthe, the Netherlands, in the historical context of the 19th century. By running advanced spatiotemporal models, we find empirical evidence in favor of the so-called antebellum puzzle. This puzzle states that although the 19th-century infrastructure improvements had a positive effect on the standard of living in the long term, the short-term effect is negative.