Two Millennia of Chinese Economic Growth
Keywords:
Historical GDP, Economic Growth, Malthus, Unified Growth TheoryAbstract
We construct a continuous decadal GDP dataset for China spanning 220 BCE to 1949 CE. Over more than two millennia, China’s economic trajectory exhibits a millennial-scale inverted U-shape: GDP per capita (1990 international dollars) rose from 380 in 220 BCE to a peak of 1,430 in 1000 CE, then entered a period of fluctuating decline after the Northern Song, stabilizing at around 550 by the early twentieth century. Our empirical analysis indicates that China’s long-run economic growth followed a Malthusian pattern. The key difference between the first and second millennia lies in the emergence of severe land–population pressures during the latter, coupled with weak performance in human capital accumulation and technological progress. Chinese history demonstrates that long-term economic growth has been fundamentally knowledge-driven.
Downloads
References (91)
Acemoglu, Daron, Simon Johnson, and James Robinson. “The rise of Europe: Atlantic trade, institutional change, and economic growth.” American Economic Review 95, no. 3 (2005): 546-579.
A’Hearn, Brian, Jörg Baten, and Dorothee Crayen. “Quantifying quantitative literacy: Age heaping and the history of human capital.” The Journal of Economic History 69, no. 3 (2009): 783-808.
Álvarez-Nogal, Carlos, and Leandro Prados de la Escosura. “The Rise and Fall of Spain, 1270-1850.” Economic History Review 66, no. 1 (2013): 1-37.
Ashraf, Quamrul, and Oded Galor. “Dynamics and Stagnation in the Malthusian Epoch.” American Economic Review 101, no. 5 (2011): 2003-2041.
Bassino, Jean-Pascal, Stephen Broadberry, Kyoji Fukao, Bishnupriya Gupta, et al. “Japan and the great divergence, 730-1874.” Explorations in Economic History 72 (2019): 1-22.
Baten, Joerg, Debin Ma, Stephen Morgan, and Qing Wang. “Evolution of living standards and human capital in China in the 18–20th centuries: Evidences from real wages, age-heaping, and anthropometrics.” Explorations in Economic History 47, no. 3 (2010): 347-359.
Bolt, Jutta, and Jan Luiten van Zanden, “Maddison Style Estimates of the Evolution of the World Economy: A New 2023 Update”, Journal of Economic Surveys (2024): 1–41. DOI: 10.1111/joes.12618”.
Broadberry, Stephen, Bruce Campbell, Alexander Klein, Mark Overton, et al. British Economic Growth, 1270-1870. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
Broadberry, Stephen, and Hanhui Guan. “Regional Variation of GDP per head within China, 1080-1850: Implications for the Great Divergence Debate.” Oxford Economic and Social History Working Papers, No. 196, 2022.
Broadberry, Stephen, Hanhui Guan, and David Daokui Li. “China, Europe, and the Great divergence: a Study in Historical National Accounting, 980-1850.” Journal of Economic History 78.4 (2018): 955-1000.
Broadberry, Stephen, Hanhui Guan, and David Daokui Li. “China, Europe, and the Great Divergence: A Restatement.” Journal of Economic History 81.3 (2021): 958-974.
Cao, Shuji. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 4: Ming shiqi (Chinese Population History, Vol. 4: Ming Dynasty). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2000.
Cao, Shuji. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 5: Qing shiqi (Chinese Population History, Vol. 5: Qing Dynasty). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2001.
Chao, Kang. Man and Land in Chinese History: An Economic Analysis. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986.
Chao, Kang. Zhongguo chengshi fazhan shilun ji (Collected Essays on the History of Urban Development in China). Beijing: New Star Press, 2006.
Chao, Kang, and Ch’ên Chung-i. “Zhongguo lishi shang de chengshi renkou” (Urban Population in Chinese History). Monthly Journal of Food and Commodities, 13, no. 3&4 (1983): 109-131.
Chi, Ch’ao-ting. Key economic areas in Chinese history as revealed in the development of public works for water-control. AM Kelley, 1936.
Clark, Gregory. A Farewell to Alms: A Brief Economic History of the World. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007.
Crafts, Nicholas, and Terence C. Mills. “From Malthus to Solow: How did the Malthusian economy really evolve?.” Journal of Macroeconomics 31, no. 1 (2009): 68-93.
Cummins, Neil. “The micro-evidence for the Malthusian system. France, 1670–1840.”
European Economic Review 129 (2020): 103544.
Deng, Kent, and Patrick O’Brien. “Why Maddison was Wrong.” World Economics 18 (2017).
Dong, Guodong. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 2: Sui-Tang-Wudai shiqi (Chinese Population History, Vol. 2: Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2002.
Elvin, Mark. The Pattern of the Chinese Past: A Social and Economic Interpretation. Stanford University Press, 1973.
Fang, Xiuqi, Fanneng He, Zhilei Wu, and Jingyun Zheng. “Guoqu 2000 nian zhongguo nongkenqu tuozhan yu kenzhilv bianhua jiben tezheng” (General Characteristics of the Agricultural Area and Fractional Cropland Cover Changes in China for the Past 2000 Years). Acta Geographica Sinica, 76 (2021): 1732-1746.
Galor, Oded. “From Stagnation to Growth: Unified Growth Theory.” Handbook of Economic Growth 1 (2005): 171-293.
Galor, Oded. Unified growth theory. Princeton university press, 2011.
Galor, Oded, and Omer Moav. “From physical to human capital accumulation: Inequality and the process of development.” The review of economic studies 71, no. 4 (2004): 1001-1026.
Galor, Oded, and David N. Weil. “Population, technology, and growth: From Malthusian stagnation to the demographic transition and beyond.” American economic review 90, no. 4 (2000): 806-828.
Ge, Jianxiong. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 1: Daolun, xianqin zhi nanbeichao shiqi (Chinese Population History, Vol. 1: Introduction and Pre-Qin to Southern and Northern Dynasties). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2000.
Guo, Songyi. Minming suoxi: qingdai de nongye he nongmin (The Key to People’s Destiny: Agriculture and Farmers in the Qing Dynasty). Beijing: China Agriculture Press, 2010.
Hansen, Gary D., and Edward C. Prescott. “Malthus to solow.” American economic review 92, no. 4 (2002): 1205-1217.
Harvard University, Academia Sinica, and Peking University, China Biographical Database, https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/cbdb.
He, Fuqiang. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Yuan Dynasty Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Yuandai Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2008.
Hou, Yangfang. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 6: 1910-1953 (Chinese Population History, Vol. 6: 1910-1953). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2001.
Hu, Sijie. “Descendants over 300 years: Marital fertility in five lineages in Qing China.”
Asia-Pacific Economic History Review 63, no. 2 (2023): 200-224.
Huang, Philip. The Peasant Economy and Social Change in North China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1985.
Huang, Philip. The Peasant Family and Rural Development in the Yangzi Delta, 1350-1988. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990.
Huang, Philip. “Development or Involution in Eighteenth-century Britain and China? A Review of Kenneth Pomeranz’s the Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy.” The Journal of Asian Studies 61.2 (2002): 501-538.
Jiao, Peimin, Chunyu Liu, and Yuxin He. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Qin and Han Dynasties Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Qinhan Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2009.
Lee, James Z., and Wang Feng. One quarter of humanity: Malthusian mythology and Chinese realities, 1700–2000. Harvard University Press, 2001.
Lee, Ronald, and Michael Anderson. “Malthus in state space: macro economic-demographic relations in English history, 1540 to 1870.” Journal of Population Economics 15, no. 2 (2002): 195-220.
Li, Bozhong. Agricultural Development in Jiangnan, 1620-1850. Springer, 1998.
Li, Bozhong. Zhongguo de zaoqi jindai jingji—1820 niandai huating-louxian diqu de GDP yanjiu (China’s Early Modern Economy—A Study on the GDP of Huating-Lou County in 1820). Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2010.
Li, Di, and Yongping Zha. Chronology of Birth and Death Years of Historical Chinese Scientific Figures (Zhongguo Lidai Keji Renwu Shengzu Nianbiao). Beijing: China Science Publishing House, 2002.
Lin, Justin Yifu. “The Needham puzzle: Why the industrial revolution did not originate in China.” Economic development and cultural change 43, no. 2 (1995): 269-292.
Liu, Paul K. C., and Kuo-shu Hwang. “Population Change and Economic Development in Mainland China since 1400”, in Hou, Chi-ming and Tzongs-hian Yu (eds.), Modern Chinese Economic History, Taipei: Academia Sinica, (1979): 61-90.
Liu, Ta-chung, and Kung-chia Yeh. The Economy of the Chinese Mainland: National Income and Economic Development, 1933-1959. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965.
Liu, Ti. “1600-1800 nian zhongguo guonei shengchanzongzhi de gusuan” (An Estimation of China’s GDP from 1600 to 1840). Economic Research Journal, no. 10 (2009): 144-155.
Ma, Debin, and Shuo Chen. “States and Wars: China’s Long March towards Unity and Its Consequences, 221 BC–1911 AD.” Centre for Economic Policy Research Discussion Paper (2020): 1-47.
Ma, Ye, and Herman de Jong. “Unfolding the Turbulent Century: A Reconstruction of China’s Historical National Accounts, 1840-1912.” Review of Income and Wealth 65.1 (2019): 75-98.
Maddison, Angus. Chinese Economic Performance in the Long Run. Paris: Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 1998.
Madsen, Jakob B., Peter E. Robertson, and Longfeng Ye. “Malthus Was Right: Explaining a Millennium of Stagnation.” European Economic Review 118 (2019): 51-68.
Malanima, Paolo. “The Long Decline of a Leading Economy: GDP in Central and Northern Italy, 1300-1913.” European Review of Economic History 15, no. 2 (2011):
169-219.
Malthus, Thomas. An Essay on the Principle of Population. An Essay on the Principle of Population, as it Affects the Future Improvement of Society with Remarks on the Speculations of Mr. Godwin, M. Condorcet, and Other Writers. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1970 [1798].
Marks, Robert B. China: An Environmental History. Rowman & Littlefield, 2017.
Min, Xiangpeng. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Sui, Tang, and Five Dynasties Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Sui Tang Wudai Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2008.
Newey, Whitney K., and Kenneth D. West. “Automatic lag selection in covariance matrix estimation.” The Review of Rconomic Studies 61, no. 4 (1994): 631-653.
Nicolini, Esteban A. “Was Malthus right? A VAR analysis of economic and demographic interactions in pre-industrial England.” European review of economic history 11, no. 1 (2007): 99-121.
Ou, Baosan. Zhongguo guomin suode: 1933yr (China’s National Income in 1933). Beijing: The Commercial Press, 2017 [1947].
Palma, Nuno, and Jaime Reis. “From Convergence to Divergence: Portuguese Economic Growth, 1527-1850.” Journal of Economic History 79.2 (2019): 477-506.
Peng, Xinwei. Zhongguo huobi shi (Chinese Monetary History). Shanghai: Shanghai People’s Publishing House, 1965.
Perkins, Dwight H. Agricultural Development in China, 1368-1968. Chicago: Aldine, 1969.
Pesaran, M. Hashem, Yongcheol Shin, and Richard J. Smith. “Bounds testing approaches to the analysis of level relationships.” Journal of Applied Econometrics 16, no. 3 (2001): 289-326.
Pomeranz, Kenneth. The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000.
Qiu, Yunfei. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Song Dynasty Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Songdai Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2008.
Rawski, Thomas G. Economic Growth in Prewar China. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989.
Rawski, Thomas G. “Weak data nullify bold claims about economic trends in Qing China.” Asia-Pacific Economic History Review forthcoming (2025).
Shi, Feng, Huayu Lu, Zhengtang Guo, Qiuzhen Yin, Haibin Wu, Chenxi Xu, Enlou Zhang et al. “The Position of the Current Warm Period in the Context of the Past 22,000 Years of Summer Climate in China.” Geophysical Research Letters 48, no. 5 (2021): e2020GL091940.
Shi, Zhihong. Qingdai nongue de fazhan yu bufazhan, 1661-1911 (Agricultural Development in Qing China, a Quantitative Study, 1661-1911). Beijing: Social Science Literature Press, 2017.
Solar, Peter M. “China’s GDP: Some Corrections and the Way Forward.” The Journal of Economic History 81.3 (2021): 943-957.
Stock, James H., and Mark W. Watson. “A simple estimator of cointegrating vectors in higher order integrated systems.” Econometrica (1993): 783-820.
Sun, Liangyu, and Yunfei Qiu. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Ming Dynasty Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Mingdai Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2009.
Wang, Yeh-chien. “Secular Trends of Rice Prices in the Yangzi Delta, 1638-1935.”
Chinese History in Economic Perspective (1992): 35-68.
Wang, Yuquan. Mingdai de juntun (Military Farming in the Ming Dynasty). Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2009.
Wei, Zhudeng, Xiuqi Fang, and Yun Su. “A Preliminary Analysis of Economic Fluctuations and Climate Changes in China from BC 220 to AD 1910.” Regional Environmental Change 15 (2015): 1773-1785.
Wu, Cunhao. Zhongguo nongye shi (Chinese Agricultural History). Beijing: Police Education Press, 1996.
Wu, Harry X. “Changes in the Occupational Structure of Chinese Workforce in the Course of China’s Industrialization and Urbanization, 1912-1952.” Economic Research, 67 (2016): 47-68.
Wu, Hui. Zhongguo lidai liangshi muchanliang yanji (Research on Grain Yields in Ancient China). Beijing: Agriculture Press, 2016 [1985].
Wu, Songdi. Zhongguo renkoushi, Vol. 3: Liao-Song-Jin-Yuan shiqi (Chinese Population History, Vol. 3: Liao-Song-Jin-Yuan Dynasties). Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 2000.
Xu, Yi , B. V. Leeuwen , and J. L. V. Zanden . “Urbanization in China, ca.1100-1900.” Frontiers of Economics in China, 13(3), (2018): 322-368.
Xu, Yi, Zhihong Shi, Bas van Leeuwen, Yuping Ni, et al. “Chinese National income, ca. 1661-1933.” Australian Economic History Review 57, no. 3 (2017): 368-93.
Yin, Jun, Xiuqi Fang, and Yun Su. “Correlation between Climate and Grain Harvest Fluctuations and the Dynastic Transitions and Prosperity in China Over the Past Two Millennia.” The Holocene 26, no. 12 (2016): 1914-1923.
Zhai, Runzhuo. “Toward the Great Divergence: Economic Growth in the Yangzi Delta, 1393-1953”, D.Phil Thesis, University of Oxford, 2023.
Zhai, Runzhuo. “Toward The Great Divergence: Agricultural Growth In The Yangzi Delta, 1393–1953.” Available at SSRN 4838585 (2024).
Zhang, Meili, Jiyao Liu, and Peimin Jiao. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Wei, Jin, and Southern and Northern Dynasties Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi:Weijin Nanbeichao Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2009.
Zhao, Wenlin, and Shujun Xie. Zhongguo renkou shi (Chinese Population History). Beijing: People’s Publishing House, 1995.
Zhu, Fengxiang. The Complete History of Natural Disasters in China: Qing Dynasty Volume (Zhongguo Ziran Zaihai Tongshi: Qingdai Juan). Zhengzhou: Zhengzhou University Press, 2009.
Downloads
How to Cite
License
Copyright (c) 2026 CQH does not retain copyright in its Working Paper Series. Copyright in each paper remains vested in the respective author(s). Contact details for the author(s) are available on the abstract page of the relevant paper.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The CQH Working Paper Series is a scholarly platform of the Centre for Quantitative History dedicated to facilitating the circulation of research. Copyright in each paper remains with the author(s). Authors publishing in the Series grant CQH a non-exclusive right to host, archive, and make the paper publicly available as part of the Series. Unless otherwise indicated, papers are distributed under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence.