Poverty and credit in a marginal port of the Spanish Monarchy: Buenos Aires during the 17th century

WASSERMAN, MARTÍN L. E.

Boston

Congreso; XVIII World Economic History Congress; 2018

ECONOMIC HISTORY ASSOCIATION - MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY - HARVARD UNIVERSITY - INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC HISTORY ASSOCIATION - THE CLIOMETRIC SOCIETY - THE ECONOMIC AND BUSINESS HISTORY SOCIETY - NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESARCH - SOCIAL SCIE

This work proposes to identify the relationship between poverty and credit, as well as the credit incidence of ecclesiastical institutions, in a marginal and emerging society: Buenos Aires during the XVII century. The declarations of poverty on the part of the inhabitants of this port village, allow establishing the limits that the poverty condition imposed for access to credit. Therefore, it will be evaluated the role of ecclesiastical credit and its singularities in the context of an economy like this, in which the process of initial formation of the real estate market impacted on the economic rationality of local ecclesiastical institutions and on their credit mercy. The limitations of the different religious orders to deploy a charitable credit policy are identified as inherent of the economic singularities and the institutional context of this village. Original manuscripts from the National General Archive from Argentina are analyzed for this purpose.