Publications
Publications
- 2024
- HBS Working Paper Series
You've Got Mail! The Late 19th-Century U.S. Postal Service Expansion, Firm Creation, and Firm Performance
By: Astrid Marinoni and Maria P. Roche
Abstract
We analyze the impact of the US Postal Service's expansion in the late 1800s on firm creation and performance. Exploiting novel data constructed from digitized archives on historic business establishments, post office locations, and road network characteristics in California, we find a positive relationship between the expansion of the postal service and firm creation. To address endogeneity concerns, we exploit an unexpected change in the Californian postal service route network. In addition, we examine feasible channels, through which the US Mail may have promoted firm entry. These include its potential role as a financial service, as a mass commu-nication infrastructure, or as a carrier of specialized knowledge. Our results suggest that of these proposed mechanisms, the latter played a particularly important role. Moreover, while increasing competition given new entry exerted downward pressure on the performance of many incumbents, actors relying on specialized knowledge inputs were able to most strongly benefit from local access to the US Mail.
Keywords
Institutional Innovation; Knowledge Exchange; US Postal Service; Firm Performance; Infrastructure; Expansion; Government Administration; Communication; Business History; Entrepreneurship; Public Administration Industry; California
Citation
Marinoni, Astrid, and Maria P. Roche. "You've Got Mail! The Late 19th-Century U.S. Postal Service Expansion, Firm Creation, and Firm Performance." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 23-022, October 2022. (Revised March 2024.)