SLAVERY AND SOUTHERN ECONOMIC-GROWTH

The evidence relating to Southern antebellum income is reviewed, then discussed in the light of the peculiarities of the Southern economic system. The links between slavery and Southern economic growth are discussed. Per capita income was lower in the South, but income growth roughly equalled the Northern experience. Economic growth involved innovation and structural change but the South grew chiefly by reallocating labour in the direction of better agricultural land. Slavery was largely responsible for the persistence of agriculture, a planter could expand by buying more labourers, but he could not lay them off temporarily as a Northern factory owner could when orders fell. -J.Johnson