The Poverty of Slavery (eBook)

How Unfree Labor Pollutes the Economy

Robert E. Wright (Autor)

eBook Download: PDF

2017 | 1st ed. 2017
IX, 302 Seiten
Springer International Publishing (Verlag)
978-3-319-48968-1 (ISBN)

Infos

This ground-breaking book adds an economic angle to a traditionally moral argument, demonstrating that slavery has never promoted economic growth or development, neither today nor in the past. While unfree labor may be lucrative for slaveholders, its negative effects on a country's economy, much like pollution, drag down all members of society. Tracing the history of slavery around the world, from prehistory through the US Antebellum South to the present day, Wright illustrates how slaveholders burden communities and governments with the task of maintaining the system while preventing productive individuals from participating in the economy.

Historians, economists, policymakers, and anti-slavery activists need no longer apologize for opposing the dubious benefits of unfree labor. Wright provides a valuable resource for exposing the hidden price tag of slaving to help them pitch antislavery policies as matters of both human rights and economic well-being.

Robert E. Wright is the Nef Family Chair of Political Economy at Augustana University, USA. He has co/authored or co/edited two dozen books on US economic history and policy, including Corporation Nation, Fubarnomics, and One Nation Under Debt. He has served on the board of Historians Against Slavery, an NGO, since 2012.

Inhalt

Previous Publications 5
Acknowledgments 7
Bibliography 8
Contents 9
Chapter 1: Yet Another Half Untold 10
Notes 23
Bibliography 23
Chapter 2: Various Degrees of Liberty 27
Notes 42
Bibliography 42
Chapter 3: A Not So Peculiar Institution 47
Bibliography 73
Chapter 4: Slavery Resilient 80
Notes 114
Bibliography 114
Chapter 5: That Which Is Seen: Enslavers´ Profits 123
Note 142
Bibliography 142
Chapter 6: That Which Is Unseen I: Slavery´s Pollution 148
The Enslaved and Their Immediate Families 150
Slaves´ Places of Origin 158
Enslavers 163
Population Growth 169
Non-slave Laborers and Their Employers 173
Education, Infrastructure, and Technology 175
Agricultural Productivity and the Environment 181
Governance, Institutional Quality, and the Distribution of Wealth and Income 183
Public Perceptions 190
Note 192
Bibliography 192
Chapter 7: That Which Is Unseen II: Slavery´s Hidden Costs 203
The Costs of Protecting Slaves, Non-Slaves, and Enslavers from Themselves and Each Other 205
Public Control Costs 217
Interdiction and Restoration Costs 222
Summing Up the Costs 227
Bibliography 229
Chapter 8: Real Abolition 237
Bibliography 248
Bibliography 252
Index 277

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 20.2.2017
• Zusatzinfo: IX, 302 p.
• Verlagsort: Cham
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Volkswirtschaftslehre
• Schlagworte: Abolition • chattel • coerced labor • Emancipation • Forced Labor • Human Trafficking • Labor • Market Failure • negative externality • sex slavery • Sexual Exploitation
• ISBN-10: 3-319-48968-2 / 3319489682
• ISBN-13: 978-3-319-48968-1 / 9783319489681