VOL.91 NO.5 ACEMOGLU ET AL:THE COLONIAL ORIGINS OF DEVELOPMENT 1377 TABLE 1-DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS By quartiles of mortality Whole world Base sample (1) (2) (3) (4) Log GDP per capita (PPP)in 1995 8.3 8.05 8.9 8.4 7.73 7.2 (1.1) (1.1) Log output per worker in 1988 -1.70 -1.93 -1.03 -1.46 -2.20 -3.03 (with level of United States (1.1) (1.0) normalized to 1) Average protection against 7 6.5 7.9 6.5 6 5.9 expropriation risk,1985-1995 (1.8) (1.5) Constraint on executive in 1990 3.6 4 5.3 5.1 3.3 2.3 (2.3) (2.3) Constraint on executive in 1900 1.9 2.3 3.7 3.4 1.1 1 (1.8) (2.1) Constraint on executive in first year 3.6 3.3 4.8 2.4 3. 3.4 of independence (2.4) (2.4) Democracy in 1900 1.1 1.6 3.9 2.8 0.19 0 (2.6) (3.0) European settlements in 1900 0.31 0.16 0.32 0.26 0.08 0.005 (0.4) (0.3) Log European settler mortality n.a. 4.7 3.0 4.3 4.9 6.3 (1.1) Number of observations 163 64 14 18 17 15 Notes:Standard deviations are in parentheses.Mortality is potential settler mortality,measured in terms of deaths per annum per 1,000"mean strength"(raw mortality numbers are adjusted to what they would be if a force of 1,000 living people were kept in place for a whole year,e.g.,it is possible for this number to exceed 1,000 in episodes of extreme mortality as those who die are replaced with new arrivals).Sources and methods for mortality are described in Section III,subsection B,and in the unpublished Appendix(available from the authors;or see Acemoglu et al.,2000).Quartiles of mortality are for our base sample of 64 observations.These are:(1)less than 65.4;(2)greater than or equal to 65.4 and less than 78.1;(3)greater than or equal to 78.1 and less than 280;(4)greater than or equal to 280.The number of observations differs by variable;see Appendix Table Al for details. money to enforce property rights,while and our basic sample,and the standard devia- those who have less to lose may not be. tion of log income per capita in both cases is 1.1.In row 3,we also give output per worker in II.Institutions and Performance: 1988 from Hall and Jones (1999)as an alterna- OLS Estimates tive measure of income today.Hall and Jones (1999)prefer this measure since it explicitly A.Data and Descriptive Statistics refers to worker productivity.On the other hand,given the difficulty of measuring the for- Table 1 provides descriptive statistics for the mal labor force,it may be a more noisy measure key variables of interest.The first column is for of economic performance than income per the whole world,and column(2)is for our base capita. sample,limited to the 64 countries that were We use a variety of variables to capture in- ex-colonies and for which we have settler mor- stitutional differences.Our main variable,re- tality,protection against expropriation risk,and ported in the second row,is an index of GDP data (this is smaller than the sample in protection against expropriation.These data are Figure 1).The GDP per capita in 1995 is PPP from Political Risk Services (see,e.g.,William adjusted (a more detailed discussion of all data D.Coplin et al.,1991),and were first used in the sources is provided in Appendix Table Al). economics and political science literatures by Income (GDP)per capita will be our measure of Knack and Keefer (1995).Political Risk Ser- economic outcome.There are large differences vices reports a value between 0 and 10 for each in income per capita in both the world sample country and year,with 0 corresponding to theVOL. 91 NO. 5 ACEMOGLU ET AL.: THE COLONIAL ORIGINS OF DEVELOPMENT 1377 By quartiles of mortality Whole world Base sample (1) (2) (3) (4) Log GDP per capita (PPP) in 1995 Log output per worker in 1988 (with level of United States normalized to 1) Average protection against expropriation risk, 1985-1995 Constraint on executive in 1990 Constraint on executive in 1900 Constraint on executive in first year of independence Democracy in 1900 European settlements in 1900 Log European settler mortality Number of observations Notes: Standard deviations are in parentheses. Mortality is potential settler mortality, measured in terms of deaths per annum per 1,000 "mean strength" (raw mortality numbers are adjusted to what they would be if a force of 1,000 living people were kept in place for a whole year, e.g., it is possible for this number to exceed 1,000 in episodes of extreme mortality as those who die are replaced with new arrivals). Sources and methods for mortality are described in Section 111, subsection B, and in the unpublished Appendix (available from the authors; or see Acemoglu et al., 2000). Quartiles of mortality are for our base sample of 64 observations. These are: (1) less than 65.4; (2) greater than or equal to 65.4 and less than 78.1; (3) greater than or equal to 78.1 and less than 280; (4) greater than or equal to 280. The number of observations differs by variable; see Appendix Table A1 for details. money to enforce property rights, while and our basic sample, and the standard devia￾those who have less to lose may not be. tion of log income per capita in both cases is 1.1. In row 3, we also give output per worker in 11. Institutions and Performance: 1988 from Hall and Jones (1999) as an alterna￾OLS Estimates tive measure of income today. Hall and Jones (1999) prefer this measure since it explicitly A. Data and Descriptive Statistics refers to worker productivity. On the other hand, given the difficulty of measuring the for￾Table 1 provides descriptive statistics for the mal labor force, it may be a more noisy measure key variables of interest. The first column is for of economic performance than income per the whole world, and column (2) is for our base capita. sample, limited to the 64 countries that were We use a variety of variables to capture in￾ex-colonies and for which we have settler mor- stitutional difference~. Our main variable, re￾tality, protection against expropriation risk, and ported in the second row, is an index of GDP data (this is smaller than the sample in protection against expropriation. These data are Figure 1). The GDP per capita in 1995 is PPP from Political Risk Services (see, e.g., William adjusted (a more detailed discussion of all data D. Coplin et al., 1991), and were first used in the sources is provided in Appendix Table Al). economics and political science literatures by Income (GDP) per capita will be our measure of Knack and Keefer (1995). Political Risk Ser￾economic outcome. There are large differences vices reports a value between 0 and 10 for each in income per capita in both the world sample country and year, with 0 corresponding to the