The impact of the Civil War on capital intensity and labor productivity in southern manufacturing

Hutchinson, William K.; Margo, Robert A.

doi:10.1016/j.eeh.2005.08.001

Cited by 13 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 13 publications

(16 reference statements)

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“…Thus, on average, black Americans were a relatively poor population and concentrated in a relatively poor region, as the South lagged behind the rest of the US (Engerman 1966, Margo 2004. The immediate post-bellum South presented additional headwinds, including high rates of incarceration, "black codes" that limited blacks' mobility, and scarce credit (Myrdal 1944, Ransom and Sutch 1977, Woodman 1995, Hutchinson and Margo 2006.…”

Section: A Historical Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

African American Intergenerational Economic Mobility Since 1880

Collins¹,

Wanamaker²

2017

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We document the intergenerational mobility of black and white American men from 1880 through 2000 by building new historical datasets and combining them with modern data to cover the middle and late twentieth century. We find large disparities, with white children having far better chances of escaping the bottom of the income distribution than black children in every generation. This mobility gap was more important in proximately determining each generation's racial income gap than was the gap in parents' economic status. Evidence suggests that human capital disparities, conditional on parents' status, underpinned a substantial part of the mobility gap.

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Section: A Historical Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

African American Intergenerational Economic Mobility Since 1880

Collins¹,

Wanamaker²

2017

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“…8 There is good historical evidence of capital-labor substitution for the nineteenth century United States. Manufacturing in the South after the Civil War became much less capital intensive as interest rates (a component of the rental price of capital) rose relative to the wages of unskilled labor (Hutchinson and Margo 2006). 9 A complementary explanation is that artisans maintained their own tools in a time-intensive process.…”

Section: Interpreting Historical Complementarities: a Simple Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Technical Change and the Relative Demand for Skilled Labor: The United States in Historical Perspective

Katz¹,

Margo²

2013

140

116

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, and conference participants are gratefully acknowledged. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research. At least one co-author has disclosed a financial relationship of potential relevance for this research. Further information is available online at http://www.nber.org/papers/w18752.ack NBER working papers are circulated for discussion and comment purposes. They have not been peerreviewed or been subject to the review by the NBER Board of Directors that accompanies official NBER publications.

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“…Goldin and Lewis (1975) estimated that the former Confederate states had a lower per capita income than other states and that income in the South fell after the war. 10 Wages fell in the South relative to the North after the war (Margo 2002), as did output per worker in manufacturing, driven in large part by declines in relative capital intensity (Hutchinson and Margo 2006). Goldin (1979) argues that there were three main reasons for the decline in Southern per capita income after the War-loss of economies of scale, decline in relative demand for southern cotton, and a decrease in ex-slave labor force participation-generally dismissing capital destruction as a factor.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Capital Destruction and Economic Growth: The Effects of Sherman's March, 1850-1920

Feigenbaum¹,

Lee²,

Mezzanotti³

2018

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Using General William Sherman's 1864--65 military march through Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina during the American Civil War, this paper studies the effect of capital destruction on short-and long-run local economic activity, and the role of financial markets in the recovery process. We match an 1865 US War Department map of Sherman's march to county-level demographic, agricultural, and manufacturing data from the 1850-1920 US Censuses. We show that the capital destruction induced by the March led to a large contraction in agricultural investment, farming asset prices, and manufacturing activity. Elements of the decline in agriculture persisted through 1920. Using information on local banks and access to credit, we argue that the underdevelopment of financial markets played a role in weakening the recovery. * We thank

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The impact of the Civil War on capital intensity and labor productivity in southern manufacturing

Cited by 13 publications

References 13 publications

African American Intergenerational Economic Mobility Since 1880

African American Intergenerational Economic Mobility Since 1880

Technical Change and the Relative Demand for Skilled Labor: The United States in Historical Perspective

Capital Destruction and Economic Growth: The Effects of Sherman's March, 1850-1920

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