Research Interests
Economic History, Long-run Economic Growth and Development, Labor, Education, Political Economy, Inequality
Short Bio
Erik Hornung is a Professor of Economic History at the University of Cologne. He is a member in the Cluster of Excellence ECONtribute: Markets & Public Policy, a Research Fellow at CESifo, CEPR, and CAGE, and an Associate Editor at The Economic Journal.
His main research interests are the determinants of long-run development and economic growth. He uses microeconometric methods to analyze the driving forces of the transition to the modern economic growth including aspects of institutional change, human capital formation, and technological diffusion.
Hornung studied economics and technics at the University of Stuttgart, the University of Ottawa, and the University of Hohenheim. He worked in the Department of Human Capital and Innovation at the ifo-Institute and as a tax advisor in the Transfer Pricing Group of Deloitte and Touche GmbH before joining the Max Planck Institute of Tax Law and Public Finance as a senior research fellow. He completed his Ph.D. at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich in 2012. The Leibniz Association rewarded his work with the Dissertation Award 2013. From 2016 to 2017, he was Professor of Economics with a specialization in quantitative Economic History at the University of Bayreuth.
Working Papers
Hidalgo, E.; Hornung, E.; Selaya, P. (2022): "NAFTA and drug-related violence in Mexico". CESifo Working Paper (9981).
Publications
Articles in Refereed Journals
Bauernschuster, S., Blum, M., Hornung, E., & Koenig, C. (2025). The political effects of the 1918 influenza pandemic in Weimar Germany. Explorations in Economic History, 96, 101648. DOI
Hornung, E., Schwerdt, G., & Strazzeri, M. (2023). Religious practice and student performance: Evidence from Ramadan fasting. Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 205, 100–119. DOI
Flückiger, M., Hornung, E., Larch, M., Ludwig, M., & Mees, A. (2021). Roman Transport Network Connectivity and Economic Integration. The Review of Economic Studies, 89(2), 774–810. DOI
Becker, S. O., & Hornung, E. (2020). The Political Economy of the Prussian Three-Class Franchise. The Journal of Economic History, 80(4), 1143–1188. DOI
Bauernschuster, S., Driva, A., & Hornung, E. (2019). Bismarck’s Health Insurance and the Mortality Decline. Journal of the European Economic Association, 18(5), 2561–2607. DOI
Hornung, E. (2019). Diasporas, diversity, and economic activity: Evidence from 18th-century Berlin. Explorations in Economic History, 73, 101261. DOI
Cinnirella, F., & Hornung, E. (2016). Landownership concentration and the expansion of education. Journal of Development Economics, 121, 135–152. DOI
Hornung, E. (2015). RAILROADS AND GROWTH IN PRUSSIA. Journal of the European Economic Association, 13(4), 699–736. DOI
Becker, S. O., Cinnirella, F., Hornung, E., & Woessmann, L. (2014). iPEHD—The ifo Prussian Economic History Database. Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History, 47(2), 57–66. DOI
Hornung, E. (2014). Immigration and the Diffusion of Technology: The Huguenot Diaspora in Prussia. American Economic Review, 104(1), 84–122. DOI
Summaries of Doctoral Dissertations. (2013). The Journal of Economic History, 73(2), 537–570. DOI
Becker, S. O., Hornung, E., & Woessmann, L. (2011). Education and Catch-up in the Industrial Revolution. American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, 3(3), 92–126. DOI
Monographs
Hornung, E. (2012): "Human Capital, Technology Diffusion, and Economic Growth - Evidence from Prussian Census Data,". ifo Beiträge zur Wirtschaftsforschung (46).
Bookchapters
Becker, S.; Cinnirella, F.; Hornung, E. (2023): "Education systems and human capital accumulation". in U. Pfister and N. Wolf (Eds.), An Economic History of the First German Unification, Routledge : p. 255-273.
Becker, S.; Cinnirella, F.; Hornung, E. (2021): "Bildung, Entwicklung und Nationsbildung im 19. Jahrhundert". in U. Pfister, J.-O. Hesse, M. Spoerer and N. Wolf (Eds.), Deutschland 1871: Die Nationalstaatsbildung und der Weg in die moderne Wirtschaft, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen .
Cinnirella, F.; Hornung, E. (2017): "Land Inequality, Education, and Marriage: Theory and Empirical Evidence". in M. Cervellati and U. Sunde (Eds.), Demographic Change and Long Run Development, MIT Press, Cambridge (CESifo Working Paper No. 6072, CEPR Discussion Paper No. 1148) .