Mortality Data.”

David Albouy’s (2006) third comment on our “Colonial Origins of Comparative Development ” (hereafter AJR, 2001) is not an improvement on his earlier work. The substantive disagreement between AJR (2001) and Albouy's current and previous comments revolve around Africa. Specifically, Albouy changes a number of African data points. His selective edits are highly implausible, but this is beside the point. As documented in our original 2000 working paper, in our 2001 published article, in our previous 2005 response to Albouy, and in this note, our results regarding the positive effect of institutions on income per capita are just as strong without African data in the sample (and this is confirmed by Albouy’s own preferred data series). Our results are also robust when African data are capped at various reasonable levels, for example assuming that Africa had only slightly higher mortality than relatively unhealthy parts of the West or East Indies. Our results are weakened only when the data are altered so as to imply Africa before 1850 was a healthier place for potential European immigrants than was most of the world (including much of Europe!). These edits are at odds with all the available evidence both from contemporary sources and more modern assessments