Abstract
The excess of wages in risky over safe occupations provides a relatively culture–free measure of the welfare level of ordinary people. In contrast, conventional welfare measures are highly dependent on culture and therefore of little use in making cross–country welfare comparisons. The available international data reveal that the incomes of individuals in European cultures must be expanded approximately six times in order to achieve the same welfare levels (risky/safe wage differentials) obtained in non–European cultures. Alternative hypotheses explaining this large differential are developed and tested, the most satisfactory being that 19Ih century Western educational reforms generated a welfare–decreasing relative–income effect.
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