bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
New Tools for the Economic Historian
Authors: Johnson E. A. J.
Published: August 2016

Archeologists assure us that organized social life has existed on this earth for about two hundred and fifty thousand years. How millions of people have sought to satisfy their wants over this tremendous span of time is the acknowledged province of economic history. Yet, for lack of records, the gild of economic historians must, for the most part, confine their attention to the last one per cent of this time span; indeed the great bulk of research in economic history is devoted the last one-tenth of one per cent of the archeologists' two hundred and fifty thousand years of social history. Even then the economic historian is utterly overwhelmed with facts. He who essays to write the economic history of the United States, for example, must depict as best can the economic activities of people for more than a hundred and fifty years, farmers, merchants, manufacturers, wage-earners, rentiers; men, women and children in all walks of life, in all variety of occupations. The task is utterly staggering. An army of economic historians would be required to write a complete economic history of the United States; a regiment at least to write a faithful factual account of a single industry.
The Organization and Functions of Anglo-American Merchant Bankers, 1815–1860
Authors: Hidy Ralph W.
Published: August 2016

Prior to the Civil War in the United States much of the economic development of the country was financed by means of European credit, extended for both short and long terms. The flow of capital was chiefly from England and considerable Continental capital moved through England to the United States. A few firms in England were the chief instruments in this process of financing American trade and marketing American securities. These Anglo-American merchant bankers are the subject of this paper.
Medieval Gilds Reconsidered
Authors: Thrupp Sylvia L.
Published: August 2016

Present-day economic historians display an uneasy feeling that medieval gilds have enjoyed much more attention than they deserve. Professor Heckscher compares them unfavorably with later gilds, Professor Gras grudges them credit for anything save the keeping of records to mislead historians, and the authors of a recent textbook almost apologize for pausing to describe them. In general, this reaction from former attitudes reflects a shift of interest from the interpretation of economic policy to other problems that now appear more fundamental. We have a quantity of information about gild policies, but it leaves us uncertain whether or not the gilds were of any real importance in the history of economic development.
Other Wests Than Ours
Authors: Heaton Herbert
Published: August 2016

This is frankly a paper with a purpose. It is a plea for the abandonment of that academic isolationism that marks our teaching of the economic history of the United States, and for at least an occasional glance at those other new countries to which Europeans flocked between the sixteenth century and the drying up of intercontinental migration less than two decades ago. The plea might be made on the high ground of promoting international understanding and of making our leadership in world affairs better informed. I am content to present it on the lower plane of improving our teaching of this country's economic and social development. If we examine the story of those areas that have had basically the same experience as ours, we begin to notice the significance of some things here that we have always taken for granted. Some of our problems lose their terror when we discover that other countries are also plagued with them; some of our ideas or methods may look better, or worse, when we contrast them with those of other regions; and some of our achievements may appear greater, or less, when we place them alongside the accomplishments of Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders, South Africans, Latin Americans, or Russians in Siberia. It used to be said that the study of the varied forms of government in the eastern Mediterranean made the Greeks good political scientists. Some comparative study of the quantity and character of material development among the peoples just listed might make us better American economic historians.
Non-Importation, 1806–1812
Authors: Heaton Herbert
Published: August 2016

Peter A. Schenck, Surveyor of Customs and Inspector of Revenue for the Port of New York, must have felt slightly exhilarated when he left his office on the evening of December 30, 1807. He had that day wielded for the first time the two-edged sword placed in his hands by Congress for the destruction of British maritime arrogance. Nay more, he had struck at least seven times, by seizing that number of shipments of British goods which had arrived in two vessels ten days before. In a few days Nathan Sanford, the District Attorney, would file seven separate libels in the Federal District Court on behalf of the United States vs. twenty-two bales of woolen cloth, two cases of hats, eight boxes linen cloth, sixteen boxes of linens, one case of woolen hosiery, two cases of plated ware, and two boxes of woolen hosiery. The goods would doubtless be condemned, for Sanford was a clever lawyer and the district judge was not, like the fellow up in Massachusetts, unfriendly to Jeffersonian policies. Later the United States marshal, Peter Curtenius, would have them sold by auction outside the Tontine Coffee House; the court and marshal's costs—totaling about $120 in each case—would be paid, and the balance, where there was any, would be shared equally between the customs staff and the Treasury. If this process could be repeated often enough, John Bull might soon be willing to come to terms.
Interstate Redistribution of Population, 1850–1940
Authors: Hoover Edgar M.
Published: August 2016

Since this country attained approximately its present continental boundaries nearly a century ago, vast shifts have occurred in the geographical pattern of its population. Immigration from abroad contributed many millions to the overall increase of more than 100,000,000 during the period 1850–1940; domestic migration carried settlement westward; and natural increase of the populations of different areas at differing ratios contributed a substantial but unmeasured element to geographical redistribution.
In Praise of Medieval Tinkers
Authors: Stephenson Carl
Published: August 2016

The subject of technology, it has long been agreed, is of vital interest to the economic historian, as well as to the historian of science. the latter connection my ignorance is such that I can do no more than make a few hesitant observations, largely inspired by a very competent adviser. In the former connection I should presumably speak with greater assurance, because my own research for a good many years has been concerned with medieval society. But with regard the difficult problem of technological advance and its significance, must confess that I can ask many more questions than I can answer—as will be seen from what follows. Such questions must be faced by anyone who considers history more than an antiquarian hobby. For what phase of historical investigation can be more important than the development of the industrial society in which we live ? Precisely where is taking mankind nobody knows. We historians—medievalists and others—must at least remark its novelty and try better to understand it by explaining its origins.
The Japanese Village in the Seventeenth Century
Authors: Smith Thomas C.
Published: August 2016

As in the Middle Ages in the West, so in Tokugawa Japan (1600–1868) men were fond of explaining the hierarchical society in which they lived by comparing it to an organism. Social classes, Confucian scholars said, were like parts of the body: each had a vital function to perform, but their functions were essentially different and unequal in value. In this scheme the peasants were second in importance only to the ruling military class. Just as the samurai officials were the brains that guided other organs, so the peasants were the feet that held the social body erect. They were the “basis of the country,” the valued producers whose labor sustained all else. But, as a class, they tended innately to backsliding and extravagance. Left alone they would consume more than their share of the social income, ape the manners and tastes of their betters, and even encroach upon the functions of other classes to the perilous neglect of their own. Only the lash of necessity and the sharp eye of the official could hold them to their disagreeable role. They had to be bound to the land; social distinctions had to be thrown up around them like so many physical barriers; and, to remove all temptation to indolence and luxury, they had to be left only enough of what they produced to let them continue producing.
National Income Estimates for the United States Prior to 1870
Authors: Kuznets Simon
Published: August 2016

The analysis summarized below was made in an attempt to study long-term changes in the level and composition of national income in the United States. For reasons that will become dear, this attempt had to be limited to measures for years since 1870; but before this decision was reached, I had to scrutinize and reject the current and rather widely used estimates for the years prior to 1870. The notes below summarize the results of this scrutiny and may be of interest to other workers in the field.
Bank Administration, 1780–1914
Authors: Redlich Fritz
Published: August 2016

I am going to begin by asking a theoretical question or, if this term appears too ambitious, I am going first to circumscribe by way of generalization the role of business administration in economic development. In the second instance the hypotheses so gained will be tested through application to the history of American banking administration between 1780 and 1914. However, before starting on this task we must agree about the terminology to be used, since the word “administration” may connote either a series of actions, namely, the practice of administering something, or the personnel which professionally administers, say, a business enterprise or a public agency or the like. The same holds true mutatis mutandis of the term “management” which in this paper will have a specific meaning. I am going to apply both connotations to the terms administration and management, but in such a way that no misunderstanding is possible.
The Pragmatic Basis of Keynes's Political Economy
Authors: Dillard Dudley
Published: August 2016

Although we still live in the shadow of the years between the First and the Second World Wars, already it seems quite clear that future historians of economic thought will regard John Maynard Keynes as the outstanding economist of this turbulent period. As one writer has recently said, “The rapid and widespread adoption of the Keynesian theory by contemporary economists, particularly by those who at first were highly critical, will probably be recorded in the future history of economic thought as an extraordinary happening.” Book after book by leading economists acknowledges a heavy debt to the stimulating thought of Lord Keynes. The younger generation of economists, especially those whose thinking matured during the great depression of the thirties, have been particularly influenced by him.
The Spring-Wheat Farmer in a Maturing Economy 1870–1920
Authors: Saloutos Theodore
Published: August 2016

The spring-wheat region, stretching from central Minnesota across the X Dakotas and into Montana, has been the seat of much unrest owing to its unbalanced development from 1870 to 1920. It was colonized by seekers of the proverbial “free home” and fabulous profits to be had by raising wheat. As a result many farmers assumed burdensome economic ties and fell victims to over-optimism. Their difficulties were due to a variety of complex factors, some within and others outside their control; yet, one trend stood out noticeably: the grain growers persisted in a ruinous, anarchistic form competition, whereas among the merchants and their powerful allies competition was closely regulated.
International Migration and Economic Growth: Australia, 1865–1935
Authors: Kelley Allen C.
Published: August 2016

The nature of migration into Australia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries provides much valuable material relating to the mechanism of interregional population transfers during one of the most important periods of demographic redistribution in recorded history. Examining this country's experience during the seventy years, 1865–1935, two problems are treated which not only contribute to the understanding of Australian growth but also provide insight into important aspects of American economic development.
Antebellum Urbanization in the American Northeast
Authors: Williamson Jeffrey G.
Published: August 2016

No one seriously questions the familiar association either between levels of urban development and degrees of industrial maturity or between rates of change in these two indices. It has even become commonplace in macroeconomic growth theory to simplify the complexities of structural change into some variation of the urban-rural two-sector model although, in the real world, shifts from commercial to industrial urban employment, let alone more complex intersectoral shifts, are of prime importance. Indeed, many of these growth models place great emphasis not upon changes in sector productivity but upon resource shifts between low- and high-productivity employment, while in empirical studies urban and rural population data very often appear as explicit substitutes for sectoral employment. But given the paucity of macroeconomic data for the antebellum period, especially prior to 1839, one is left puzzled by our relative inattention to the wealth of population census data by residence. American economic history textbooks are stuffed with quantitative information on the number of cities, their spectacular growth, and the percentage of population urbanized, but these may not be the most effective uses of this great data pool. The plethora of urban histories and the abundant attention to urban rivalry may be useful complements, but they are not very effective substitutes for quantitative analysis of overall American urbanization and experience with city size distribution. The very attention which the topic is currently receiving by economists, geographers, and historians suggests that much remains undone in the study of early American urbanization.
The New Brunswick Economy in the Nineteenth Century
Authors: McClelland P. D.
Published: August 2016

The central problem of the thesis is the retardation of regional growth. The economy of New Brunswick has provided a case in point for over a hundred years. That is to say, real per capita income within the province has tended to lag behind that achieved in competing regions. This competition has been viewed primarily as a scramble for factors of production. The winners were those areas which attracted factors from lagging sectors whenever income differentials became significant. The losers, in turn, could find in such an exodus a major reason why retardation developed cumulative tendencies.
Northern Pine Lumbermen: A Study in Origins and Migrations
Authors: Kohlmeyer Frederick W.
Published: August 2016

The work of converting the undeveloped forest resources of the Lake States into usable forms absorbed the energies of thousands of individual entrepreneurs. Their combined activity was scarcely able to meet the insatiable demand from the growing number of settlements that dotted the Midwestern prairies and from villages throughout the nation that were growing into towns or mushrooming into major cities. A universal building material was indispensable during a time of rapid economic expansion. Moreover, in the prevailing Age of Wood, white pine lumber, of the finest quality and incredibly low in price, was fortuitously available in abundance.
Fixed Capital in the Industrial Revolution in Britain
Authors: Pollard Sidney
Published: August 2016

The provision of capital is generally recognized to be one of the main problems of countries undergoing the process of industrialization. This is true also of the special case of Great Britain, the first country to experience an industrial revolution. In the British case, however, it is important to note that much capital had been accumulated even before the 1760's, the decade when industrial growth began to accelerate and to change its direction. Most of this earlier capital was invested in commerce, in finance, in farming, and in stocks of manufactured goods and raw materials, and what was noteworthy in the next two generations was, not so much the absolute (and probably also relative) growth in the quantity of capital, but a change in its composition: the emergence, for the first time, of large concentrations of fixed capital.
The Coming of the Railway and United Kingdom Economic Growth
Authors: Mitchell B. R.
Published: August 2016

According to W. W. Rostow, “the introduction of the railroad has been historically the most powerful single initiator of take-offs,” having “three major kinds of impact on economic growth during the take-off period,” namely, lowering transport costs and bringing new areas and products into the market; developing a major new export sector; and leading on to the development of modern coal, iron, and engineering industries. But though all these three can be traced in mid-nineteenth-century Britain, the railways are not accorded the role of initiator in that country since, in the Rostow schema, the take-off had already occurred before the invention of the locomotive. The size of the investment in Britain's railways is such, however, that it is worth examining their impact, even if this was not so overwhelming as in some other countries.
Agriculture and Economic Growth in England, 1660–1750: Agricultural Change
Authors: Jones E. L.
Published: August 2016

Between the middle of the seventeenth century and the middle of the eighteenth century, English agriculture underwent a transformation in its techniques out of all proportion to the rather limited widening of its market. Innovations in cropping took place on a wide, though not a universal, front and independently of any great expansion of demand, which was to stimulate the extension of improved methods during the classic agricultural revolution of the late eighteenth century. Except in the sphere of stock breeding, the remainder of the century really had little to offer in the way of techniques which were new in principle. Yet the initial introduction of the most important advanced techniques had come during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, when the slow and ultimately uncertain growth of population and the modest rise in per capita national income combined to produce only a gradual growth of demand.
The French Economy in 1700–1701: An Appraisal by the Deputies of Trade
Authors: Scoville Warren C.
Published: August 2016

Louis XIV created the Council of Trade on June 29, 1700, to advise the controller general and the secretary of the marine on economic matters. The Council was to examine

… all propositions and memoranda sent it, together with such matters and difficulties which may there arise concerning external and internal trade by land and by sea, as well as factories and manufactories, in order that His Majesty may take appropriate action on the reports which the said Council of Trade will make to him of its deliberations.
The Significance of Modern Empiricism for History and Economics
Authors: Usher Abbott Payson
Published: August 2016

The relation of theoretical economics to empirical historical analysis has been one of the central problems of economic historians ever since the recognition of economic history as a separate discipline. Recent studies in logic and philosophy, by constructing new frames of meaning for both theory and history, have opened up several avenues for a fresh approach to this and other problems of importance to the historian and the economist.
The Standard of Life of the Workers in England. 1790–1830
Authors: Ashton T. S.
Published: August 2016

What happened to the standard of life of the British working classes in the late decades of the eighteenth and the early decades of the nineteenth centuries ? Was the introduction of the factory system beneficial or harmful in its effect on the workers? These, though related, are distinct questions. For it is possible that employment in factories conduced to an increase of real wages but that the tendency was more than offset by other influences, such as the rapid increase of population, the immigration of Irishmen, the destruction of wealth by long years of warfare, ill-devised tariffs, and misconceived measures for the relief of distress. Both questions have a bearing on some political and economic disputes of our own day, and this makes it difficult to consider them with complete objectivity. An American scholar (so it is said) once produced a book entitled An Impartial History of the Civil War: From the Southern Point of View. If I seek to emulate his impartiality I ought also to strive to equal his candor. Let me confess, therefore, at the start that I am of those who believe that, all in all, conditions of labor were becoming better, at least after 1820, and that the spread of the factory played a not inconsiderable part in the improvement.
Theoretical Problems of Economic Growth
Authors: Schumpeter Joseph A.
Published: August 2016

It is with some diffidence that I submit the following notes which I have not been able to work up into a fully developed argument. The inartistic use of numerals has been resorted to in order to mark off clearly the various problems touched upon.
Coal and Oil in the American Economy
Authors: Rezneck Samuel
Published: August 2016

On the occasion of Thomas Edison's death, in 1931, President Hoover issued a proclamation in which he noted that it had proved impossible to adopt the suggestion to shut down all power plants even for one minute in Edison's memory, but the President concluded that “this demonstration of the country's dependence upon electrical current for life and health is in itself a monument to Mr. Edison's genius.” The ubiquity and indispensability of electricity is, of course, a commonplace. From the standpoint of this paper and its topic, however, it may be emphasized that approximately two thirds of the electrical energy used currently in the country is generated in steam plants and hence derived largely from coal and, in smaller measure, from oil and natural gas.
The Usurer and the Merchant Prince: Italian Businessmen and the Ecclesiastical Law of Restitution, 1100–1550
Authors: Nelson Benjamin N.
Published: August 2016

Since the time of Ashley at least, it has not been possible to charge the Catholic church of the Middle Ages with having intended to throttle business enterprise by its doctrine of usury. Very few medieval writers, certainly after the early thirteenth century, wished to outlaw profit when it was a legitimate return on investment. To authoritative theologians and jurists there was a world of difference between usury, that is profit openly demanded or secretly hoped for in a contract of loan (mutuutn), and justifiable returns derived from partnerships, where there was a sharing of the risk and venture of the capital. The doctors operated with distinctions of Roman law by which the mutuum, explicitly referred to in the Vulgate at Luke 6:35, was clearly marked off from other transactions, such as the consensual contracts of partnership (societas), letting and hiring (locatio conductio), and purchase and sale (emptio venditio).
Demographic Characteristics of Florentine Patrician Families, Sixteenth to Nineteenth Centuries
Authors: Litchfield R. Burr
Published: August 2016

One seemingly certain characteristic of the social structure of Europe between the sixteenth and late eighteenth centuries was the persistence in power, wealth, and eminence of limited numbers of individuals or families. These made up the aristocracies, the nobilities of feudal origin, the ennobled officeholders of the new monarchies, and the patrician oligarchs of the towns. Political structures provided these families with privileged status and favored their preservation of wealth and influence, while a relatively slow rhythm of economic change and growth in general population tended to secure them against displacement by newcomers. In Italy, distant from the new centers of Atlantic trade, where tensions between absolutism and traditional liberties were fought out mainly within the ruling groups themselves, this stratification of society seemed almost a “new feudalism” in the seventeenth century as the powerful families of the petty courts consolidated their power.
Estimates of “Invisible” Earnings in the Balance of Payments of the British North American Colonies, 1768–1772
Authors: Shepherd James F. , Walton Gary M.
Published: August 2016

There is widespread agreement among historians of the colonial period, as there was among contemporary observers, that a significant deficit existed in the American colonies' balance of trade with Great Britain. That a large deficit did exist in the late colonial period is shown by estimates of commodity trade given in Table 1 for the period 1768 through 1772 (for which period statistics of all legal overseas trade exist in the “American Inspector-General's Ledgers”). It is clear from Table 1 that the overall deficit in the commodity trade with the British Isles was due mainly to the deficits incurred by New England and the middle colonies. Similarly, it appears that on the average for this five-year period, the southern colonies, as well, incurred a deficit—although a small one—in their commodity trade with Great Britain.
Labor Scarcity and the Problem of American Industrial Efficiency in the 1850's
Authors: Temin Peter
Published: August 2016

Europeans have been coming to America and commenting about the nature of American technology for over a century. Despite the evident economic changes in the course of this century, the comments on the differences between American and European technology—or, more properly for the nineteenth century, on the differences between American and British technology—have stayed remarkably constant. The factors noted by a few British visitors of the 1850's, perhaps the first technically qualified foreign group to take a careful look at American manufacturing, still form the backbone of discussion today. Chief among the factors noted is the high cost of American labor, but this explanation of American peculiarities by no means stands alone.
Yates and McIntyre: Lottery Managers
Authors: Aitken Hugh G. J.
Published: August 2016

The economic significance of the lottery business is a subject which historians have generally neglected. This is unfortunate, for both in Europe and the United States the lottery was at one time a capitalmobilizing device of major importance. It appears worth while, therefore, to explore in some detail the operations of a lottery firm that seems to exemplify some of the features of the system in its most mature form. This is the firm of Yates and McIntyre, lottery managers in New York State and elsewhere between 1821 and 1834.
Industrial Development of Mainland China 1912–1949
Authors: Chang John K.
Published: August 2016

In recent years much research work has been done on the economy of Communist China. With respect to economic development in the pre-Communist period, however, although several writers have attempted to view contemporary developments in the light of past performance, the existing stock of knowledge does not permit exact statements.
Values as an Obstacle to Economic Growth in South Asia: An Historical Survey
Authors: Morris Morris David
Published: August 2016

There are two widely held explanations for South Asia's failure to attain the level of economic performance achieved by the now developed countries of the world: One is that British imperial policy frustrated economic growth after 1750; the other is that the Indian value system and die social structure that reflected that value system were obstacles to economic growth. It is worthy of note that both interpretations tend to visualize pre-1750 South Asia at a level of economic organization and performance at least equal to that of western Europe in 1750, with the economic gap appearing only subsequently.
Demographic Cycles and Economic Growth: The Long Swing Reconsidered
Authors: Kelley Allen C.
Published: August 2016

For many Western countries the history of the last two centuries reveals both a sustained rise in per capita output and a tendency toward a more equal distribution of the economic product. The experience has been characterized, however, by repetitive fluctuations in the levels and growth rates of aggregate production and its components. The length of the shorter of these fluctuations, the business cycle, ranges from the 40- to 45-month inventory cycle to the so-called Juglar of seven to ten years. Two other classes of interruptions in the secular trend have also been singled out for study by economic historians. The first is the Kondratieff cycle, a movement of roughly fifty years which has been primarily identified in price series. The second is the Kuznets cycle, or “long swing,” which in length is between the Juglar and the Kondratieff. The long swing constitutes the primary theme of this study.
Farm Family By-employments in Preindustrial Japan
Authors: Smith Thomas C.
Published: August 2016

By-Employments, one may suppose, tend to ready preindustrial people for modern economic roles since they represent an incipient shift from agriculture to other occupations, spread skills useful to industrialization among the most backward and numerous part of the population, and stimulate ambition and geographical mobility. Although widespread in Western preindustrial societies, by-employments have been mainly treated there from the standpoint of the history of industry to the neglect of their effect on the habits, aptitudes, and outlook of fanners and their wives and children. This is partly due to the scattered and widely varied and changing forms of by-employments, which make it all but impossible to know what proportion of farmers practiced them and what part of their income they earned in this way.
Long-term Brazilian Economic Development
Authors: Leff Nathaniel H.
Published: August 2016

The Purpose of this article is to clarify some historical features of Brazilian economic development in order to gain some insight into the process of long-term growth. The recent extension of the principal macroeconomic time-series to 1920 and the publication of several specialized monographs provide the material for such an analysis. We will begin with a consideration of the timing of Brazilian industrialization and, more important, of the conditions in which it took place. Such a discussion is all the more necessary since it appears that some of the stock ideas concerning Brazilian economic development before 1939 require revision.
Some Social and Cultural Influences on Economic Growth: The Case of the Maori
Authors: Merrill Robert S.
Published: August 2016

Recent interest in promoting the economic development of the so-called “underdeveloped” areas has stimulated concern with the problem of the effects of social anil cultural institutions on economic growth. A major difficulty in the study of this problem is the scarcity of cases of marked economic development in non-Western cultural milieus, Japan being the major striking exception. Under these circumstances it may be of some interest to examine cases of less striking change on a smaller scale, not only for what can be learned about each case, but also for the assistance they may give in interpreting the more numerous cases of little or no economic growth.
Banking and Finance in Antebellum Louisiana: Their Influence on the Course of Economic Development
Authors: Green George D.
Published: August 2016

The thesis is an economic study of Louisiana's banking and financial system from the chartering of the first bank in 1804 to the Civil War. Primary attention is focused on the chartered banks, and on the years after the mid 1820's. This emphasis results in part from the limitations of available evidence but also from a belief that the chartered bank was the most important financial institution and that the major development of the Louisiana economy occurred after 1820. The study moves from an examination of the internal structure of the banking system itself to its setting in the state and worldwide financial system, its relations to government policy, and finally to the role of the financial system in the fluctuations and developmental patterns in the larger economy.
The Development of Large-Scale Economic Organizations in Modern America
Authors: Chandler Alfred D. , Galambos Louis
Published: August 2016

Scholars interested in modern industrial economies have for years devoted substantial attention to the growth and performance of large-scale organizations. Many of their studies have been the intellectual heirs of Max Weber's brilliant analysis of bureaucracy, for it is the bureaucratic structure of authority which most often characterizes such organizations in the modern period. Economists, historians, and sociologists are all in debt to Weber for the basic ideas which have made the analysis of large-scale organizations so fruitful.
The Genoese in Seville and the Opening of the New World
Authors: Pike Ruth
Published: August 2016

The turning point in the history of the Genoese merchants in Spain was the discovery of America and the subsequent opening of trading relations with the new continent. From then on, their ascent to economic predominance in Spain paralleled that nation's emergence as the dominant power of the sixteenth-century world. Fortune gave Spain two empires simultaneously, one in the Old World, the other in the New. Spain's unpreparedness for imperial responsibilities, particularly in the economic sphere, was the springboard for Genoese advancement. Strengthening and enlarging their colony in Seville —after 1503 the “door and port of the Indies” —the Genoese prepared to move across the Atlantic in the wake of Columbus.
Family Partnerships and Joint Ventures in the Venetian Republic
Authors: Lane Frederic C.
Published: August 2016

Corporations have been the big basic units of recent American business; in the Venetian Republic the basic units of business life were family partnerships. To be sure, since a Venetian family partnership was not an organization formed for business purposes only, it did not correspond exactly to a corporation. There were in the Venetian economy during the Later Middle Ages some enterprises which required the use of so much capital that normally several families banded together to spread the risks and for such occasions they formed joint ventures. From some points of view these joint ventures, rather than the family partnerships, corresponded in Venetian economy to the corporation in modern economy; for they were organized for strictly business purposes, they involved large capitals, and their ownership was divided into shares. But the joint ventures lacked the permanence of the modern corporation and they had quite limited objectives. They lasted only for the duration of a voyage or until a cargo had been sold. Moreover, they did not have so large capital funds as did the family partnerships which created them. Venetian business enterprise, having been fathered by the state and mothered by the family, remained subordinated to these older and stronger institutions. This fact is not surprising, for when viewed in historical perspective the modern corporation appears a parvenu of uncertain future. In most societies, at most times, it has been the great family which by its wealth, power, prestige, and presumption of permanence has been the outstanding institution in private economic enterprise.
The Branches of the First Bank of the United States
Authors: Wettereau James O.
Published: August 2016

The most interesting and distinctive feature of the first Bank of the United States was its nation-wide operation through a system of branches. It is difficult to present an even reasonably definitive analysis of that system. The records available, although more adequate than formerly, are still sadly incomplete. Enough is known, however, to reveal many complexities, political, entrepreneurial and administrative. This paper is designed to offer only a rather sketchy treatment of the following phases or aspects of the subject: prototypes and predecessors of the Bank with special reference to branch-banking; the establishment of the eight branches of the Bank; the actual operation of the branches; and the relative measure of their liquidity when the Bank was subjected to the acid test of winding up its affairs.
Malthus's General Theory of Employment and the Post-Napoleonic Depressions
Authors: O'Leary James J.
Published: August 2016

Perhaps in no other stage in history has a rapidly changing pattern of economic life raised so many acutely disturbing economic problems as it did in England during the last decade of the eighteenth and the first few decades of the nineteenth century, even as there have been few periods in which the body of economic thought has been more enriched. The era that included the Napoleonic Wars (1793–1814) and the postwar period witnessed such historic events as the suspension of specie payments by the Bank of England, modification of the corn laws, industrial depression, widespread introduction of machine technology, and the Luddite riots. Little wonder that the brilliant minds of Malthus, Ricardo, James Mill, Bentham, and many others were stimulated by the troublesome issues of the day.
Laissez Faire in Georgia, 1732–1860
Authors: Heath Milton S.
Published: August 2016

It is necessary to indicate at the outset the general character of the historical material with which this paper deals. I have been able to discover in this period of Georgia's history almost no advocacy or discussion of the doctrine of laissez faire as such. On the other hand, one finds much discussion of private and public enterprise which, if removed from the context of events, would seem to involve most of the commonly accepted tenets of laissez faire. Lastly, there are the main currents of social action, which, upon investigation, are found to have comprised a varying mixture of private and public activities. It is difficult, if not impossible, to determine the logic of the social policy which directed these currents simply by observing the varying proportions of private and public action; it would be necessary first to go behind the action and study both the ends and the means. In the limited space allotted to this paper, it is possible to present only the barest outlines of the more important events and discussions in which the issue of public interference or of private versus public action arose. Interpretations and evaluations must be left, for the most part, to additional studies
Monetary Problems in Spain and Spanish America 1731–1800
Authors: Hamilton Earl J.
Published: August 2016

The sixteenth-century Price Revolution in Spain induced by the gigantic stream of Mexican and Peruvian silver was followed by a century of alternate inflation and deflation resulting from wars and weak governments. But in spite of frequent, long, and unsuccessful wars, monetary stability characterized the first half of the eighteenth century. Then a sharp rise in the output of the precious metals, particularly of Mexican silver, increased the Spanish monetary stock and forced prices upward by almost one third in the next three decades of comparative peace. To finance a bitter conflict with England in 1779–83, Spain was compelled to resort to her first issues of paper money. The paper currency depreciated rapidly during the war but rose to par after the conclusion of peace and remained there throughout the Nootka Sound controversy.
Barriers to Economic Development in Traditional Societies: Malabar, A Case Study
Authors: Shea Thomas W.
Published: August 2016

The district of Malabar on the Southwest coast of India has been a major exporter of a wide variety of agricultural products to Europe for more than two thousand years. Despite the two millenia of sustained contact between agricultural producers and merchants, however, social relationships in land are, even today, of a predominantly feudal character; cultivation techniques are generally primitive, and the rural portion of the district, notwithstanding the great commercial importance of its produce, appears to be surprisingly impoverished. How could the social and economic organization of a people so long exposed to the influence of world market activity remain so little affected by the currents of economic change and development in the outside world? The purpose of this article is to explore, by the study of this extreme example, the reasons for the apparent failure of a pattern of sustained economic growth to become established in a rural area exposed to continuing commercial influences.
Some Neglected Factors in the English Industrial Revolution
Authors: Krause John T.
Published: August 2016

The economic differences between the Europeans on the eve of industrialization and the currently less developed peoples has assumed a certain degree of importance in the recent literature. It has been argued that West Europeans had significantly higher per capita incomes than do most of the peoples of the world today and that the levels of living of many people fell off during the process of early industrialization. Obviously, the argument is important in that the levels of living found in most of today's less developed peoples could not decline significantly widiout the risk of disaster.
Short-Term Economic Fluctuations and the Swedish Timber Industry, 1850–1900
Authors: Söderlund E. F.
Published: August 2016

The influence that short-time economic fluctuations in western Europe presumably had on the development of the Swedish timber trade during the latter half of the nineteenth century must, to an American audience, seem to be a rather specialized subject, and I think a few introductory words giving a background might be useful.
Land Tenure and Related Sectors of the Balkan Economy, 1600–1800
Authors: Stoianovich Traian
Published: August 2016

By The end of the sixteenth century, the tendency in the OttomanEmpire toward the expansion of timariote properties or military fiefs is reversed, and quasi-private properties begin again to acquire ascendancy in the Balkans. To understand die process of reversal, one must bear in mind the separation of die properties administered by die timariote into two distinct categories, die raya-čiftlik and the hassa-čiftlik The raya-čiftlik was die property over which die peasant tenant had rights of usufruct. The hassa-čiftlik was the private farm or “proprietary nucleus” of the timariote. Slowly the timariote expands his hassa-čiftlik at die expense of die raya-čiftlik. This is possible because certain peasants become indebted to timariotes, others sell dieir right of usufruct, some leave no legal heirs behind them, and others abandon dieir lands to escape plague or famine or to avoid a census, die collection of taxes, or armies on die march.
The Background of Fabian Theory
Authors: Clarkson Jesse D.
Published: August 2016

If We are to have a discussion of fabian England, it may be well at the outset to specify what we nean by fabian, even though we take England for granted. Under present circumstances in the world, die German methodology, which dictates beginning with definitions, should perhaps be employed in its Russian variant, which requires that serious discussion of any scholarly subject shall be prefaced widi an indication of what Lenin had to say on the topic. Lenin was interested i n the Fabians, interested enough to translate Industrial Democracy into Russian. It is therefore with special authority that he was able to say, “The most perfect expression of opportunism and of liberal labour politics is undoubtedly the Fabian Society.” His opinion took on added weight because he was echoing “Engels, who treats Messrs. Sidney Webb and Co. as a band of bourgeois humbugs whose aim it is to demoralize die workers, to influence them in a counter-revolutionary direction.” Lenin did recognize that “the Fabians are more sincere and honest than Kautsky and Co. because they have not promised to stand for a revolution; politically, however, diey are the same.” As we all know, in 1915, in the heat of the effort to “convert the imperialist war into civil war,” nothing more damning could be said than diat the Fabians were the same as the “pseudo-Marxist renegade” Kautsky.
The Fall of Silver in Mexico, 1870–1910, and Its Effect on American Investments
Authors: Pletcher David M.
Published: August 2016

Since the end of World War II Americans interested in international economic affairs have faced a painful dilemma. Almost every set of international policies advanced during this period has called for the widespread use of American capital to assist in the development of underdeveloped areas in Latin America, Asia, and Africa. The United States government has furnished much of this capital during the last decade, but private capital has borne a share of the effort in the past and may well be called upon for a larger share in the future. Unfortunately, in a period of frequent small wars, revolutions, and expropriations, American investors naturally hesitate to send their capital abroad if they can invest it profitably at home. One of the most vexing problems in modern international economic relations is that of predicting or assuring regular returns from American investments abroad.
The Decline of Railroad Consolidation
Authors: Leonard W. N.
Published: August 2016

Before 1920, the year in which railroad consolidation received Congressional sanction, three periods in the history of rail development the time of the Civil War the chief purpose of consolidation seems to have been to unite short connecting lines to form through routes between important terminals, usually with the approval and assistance of state legislatures. A good example was the chartering of the New York Central Railroad in 1853 by the New York legislature following the amalgamation of ten companies operating short lines in a chain of roads between Albany and Buffalo, New York. A second stage of consolidation developed from the unparalleled construction and intense intercompany competition that followed the Civil War when railroads felt the need of large systems both to offer effective service over widening geographic areas and to offset the disastrous effect of competition upon an industry of expensive, fixed, and specialized capital. It was during this period that the major eastern trunk and western transcontinental systems were formed. State laws designed to prevent the combination of competing lines were widely circumvented, or made inoperative, and the prohibition of pooling in the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 and of trade (and traffic) associations in the Sherman Act of 1890 gave new impetus to the use of consolidation as a means of escaping the enervating effects of competition. In the years following the Panic of 1893, when one fourth of the country's rail mileage passed into the hands of receivers, the use by the railroads of several new legal devices, including the interlocking directorate, the holding company, and the community of interest, not only counteracted antimonopoly legislation but produced a third and still more impressive phase of consolidation.