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Dimensions and Determinants of Early Childhood Health and Mortality Among American Slaves

Steckel, Richard H. - 1985

This paper relies on birth and death lists from plantation records to investigate the causes of low birth weight and poor health of young slave children. The sources of deprivation can be traced to the fetal period. The slave work routine was arduous overall and particularily intense during...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012477418

Estimating Neonatal Mortality Rates from the Heights of Children : The Case of American Slaves

Steckel, Richard H. - 1985

development that is unobserved among poor populations of the twentieth century. Thus slavery may have created an unusual pattern …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012477452

The Intergenerational Effects of a Large Wealth Shock : White Southerners After the Civil War

Ager, Philipp - 2019

The nullification of slave wealth after the U.S. Civil War (1861-65) was one of the largest episodes of wealth compressions in history. We document that white Southern households holding more slave assets in 1860 lost substantially more wealth by 1870, relative to households that had been...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012479651

The Economics of African American Slavery : The Cliometrics Debate

Sutch, Richard C. - 2018

This working paper explores the significant contributions to the history of African-American slavery made by the … explicit use of economic theory and quantitative methods. American slavery of the late antebellum period [1840-1860] was one of …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012480849

Manumission in Nineteenth Century Virginia

Bodenhorn, Howard - 2010

productive slaves faced more attractive labor market opportunities outside slavery, which elicited greater effort within slavery … in order to buy their way out of slavery. Further, this paper addresses three important and two emergent literatures: the … economics of slavery; the economics of stature; and the economics of complexion. The results reveal that height, complexion, and …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012462948

Ruggedness : The Blessing of Bad Geography in Africa

Nunn, Nathan - 2009

There is controversy about whether geography matters mainly because of its contemporaneous impact on economic outcomes or because of its interaction with historical events. Looking at terrain ruggedness, we are able to estimate the importance of these two channels. Because rugged terrain hinders...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012463730

The Slave Trade and the Origins of Mistrust in Africa

Nunn, Nathan - 2009

We investigate the historical origins of mistrust within Africa. Combining contemporary household survey data with historic data on slave shipments, we show that individuals whose ancestors were heavily raided during the slave trade today exhibit less trust in neighbors, relatives, and their...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012463864

Preserving Slave Families for Profit : Traders' Incentives and Pricing in the New Orleans Slave Market

Calomiris, Charles - 2008

We investigate the determinants of slave family discounts, using data from the New Orleans slave market. We find large price discounts for families which cannot be explained by scale effects, childcare costs, legal restrictions, or transport costs. Because family members cared for each other,...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012464365

Biological Innovation and Productivity Growth in the Antebellum Cotton Economy

Olmstead, Alan L. - 2008

The Cliometrics literature on slave efficiency has generally focused on static questions. We take a decidedly more dynamic approach. Drawing on the records of 142 plantations with 509 crops years, we show that the average daily cotton picking rate increased about four-fold between 1801 and 1862....

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012464504

Health, Human Capital, and African American Migration Before 1910

Logan, Trevon D. - 2008

This is the first paper to document the effect of health on the migration propensities of African Americans in the American past. Using both IPUMS and the Colored Troops Sample of the Civil War Union Army Data, I estimate the effects of literacy and health on the migration propensities of...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012464610