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Assortative Mating and the Industrial Revolution: England, 1754-2021

Using a genealogical database of 447,000 people in England 1600-2025, as well as 1.7 million marriage records 1837-2021, Professor Gregory Clark of the University of Southern Denmark and his co-author estimate assortment by social status in marriage. They find the underlying correlation of status between groom and bride in England is remarkably high at 0.8, and unchanged 1754-2021. Even before formal education and occupations for women, grooms and brides matched tightly on educational and occupational abilities. In this Quantitative History Webinar, Gregory will show further that women contributed as much as men to most child outcomes. This implies strong marital sorting substantially increased the variance of social abilities in pre-industrial England. Other pre-industrial marital systems typically involved much less marital sorting. Thus, the development of assortative marriage in north-west Europe may help explain the location and timing of the Industrial Revolution, through its effect on the supply of those with upper-tail abilities.

Gregory Clark’s co-author: Neil J. Cummins (London School of Economics and Political Science)

Discussant: Cameron Campbell, Chair Professor, Division of Social Science, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Cameron is also our Fellow)

Date: March 19, 2026

Time: 16:00 – 17:30
16:00 (Hong Kong/Beijing/Singapore)
03:00 (New York)|00:00 (Los Angeles)|08:00 (London)|17:00 (Tokyo)|19:00 (Sydney)

Venue: Zoom Webinar

Language: English

The Quantitative History (QH) Webinar Series aims to provide researchers, teachers, and students with an online intellectual platform to keep up to date with the latest research in the field, promoting the dissemination of research findings and interdisciplinary use of quantitative methods in historical research. The QH Webinar Series, now entering its sixth year, is co-organized by the Centre for Quantitative History at the HKU Business School and the International Society for Quantitative History in partnership with the Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences. The Series is now substantially supported by the Areas of Excellence (AoE) Scheme from the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Project No. [AoE/B-704/22-R]).

Conveners: Professors Zhiwu Chen & Chicheng Ma