In this week’s virtual roundtable, Dee Dee and Deana (#TheBassSisters) talk more about capitalism messaging. Using the writings of often overlooked President James Garfield, they make the argument that slavery had to end for America to move towards a more perfect moral and economic union. There is a long-held narrative that slavery fueled the U.S. Economy. But is it possible that slavery stifled economic growth? When you look at the evidence, it’s easy to argue that America would have moved farther faster if we had never engaged in the peculiar institution.
Economist Karl Smith writes, “Just before independence, the per capita gross domestic product of the South, adjusted for inflation, was $3,100 per year -- compared with just $1,832 in New England. Over the next 60 years Southern per capita GDP actually declined, to $2,521. British demand for cotton helped it to recover to $4,000 per person in 1860, but by then the comparable figure for New England was $5,3370]
Slave labor was no match for canals, railroads, steel mills and shipyards. Slavery -- and the parochial rent-seeking culture it promoted -- inhibited the growth of capitalism in the South. Ultimately, it was Northern industrial might that ended that peculiar institution in the US once and for all.”
In a nutshell, when men and women own the fruits of their labor, they are free and that is the hallmark of capitalism. When the fruits of your labor are controlled by the master or the state, that is Slavery.
THE MESSAGE MARK IS FAIRNESS:
It is fair that people own the fruits of their labor.
Servitium esto damnatum [Slavery Be Damned].
