Beyond villerme and quetelet

Abstract

The quantitative relationship between sex- and age-specific height and real per capita income is tested in this paper for the case of France for the period 1815-1986, and for the case of Italy for the years 1861-1973.1 Such a model was first developed by Brinkman, Drukker and Slot in 1985 on the basis of data on the heights of Dutch conscripts in the first decennia of the twentieth century. 2 It is demonstrated that the original model, derived from time-series covering less than half a century, still holds when it is tested against yearly data of two different countries, covering a timespan of more than a century and a half. The results of the research, summarized in this pape~ suggest that data on height can be used as estimators for changes in material well-being over time. Furthermore, timeseries of real per capita income can be used to fill in gaps where information on the development of height is missing.