Social Structure and Development: A Legacy of the Holocaust in Russia

63 Pages Posted: 19 Mar 2009 Last revised: 11 Jul 2016

See all articles by Daron Acemoglu

Daron Acemoglu

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Economics; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

Tarek A. Hassan

Boston University; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER); Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)

James A. Robinson

Harvard University - Department of Government; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)

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Date Written: June 2010

Abstract

We document a statistical association between the severity of the persecution and mass murder of Jews (the Holocaust) by the Nazis during World War II and long-run economic and political outcomes within Russia. Cities that experienced the Holocaust most intensely have grown less, and both cities and administrative districts (oblasts) where the Holocaust had the largest impact have worse economic and political outcomes since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Although we cannot rule out the possibility that these statistical relationships are caused by other factors, the overall patterns appear generally robust. We provide evidence on one possible mechanism that we hypothesize may link the Holocaust to the present - the change it induced in the social structure, in particular the size of the middle class, across different regions of Russia. Before World War II, Russian Jews were predominantly in white collar (middle class) occupations and the Holocaust appears to have had a large negative effect on the size of the middle class after the war.

Keywords: economic development, political development, Holocaust, middle class

JEL Classification: O11, P16, N40

Suggested Citation

Acemoglu, Daron and Hassan, Tarek Alexander and Robinson, James A., Social Structure and Development: A Legacy of the Holocaust in Russia (June 2010). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1364189 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1364189

Daron Acemoglu

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Department of Economics ( email )

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Tarek Alexander Hassan (Contact Author)

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James A. Robinson

Harvard University - Department of Government ( email )

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Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) ( email )

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