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> North and South, free labor and slave labor That summary is overly simplistic. Northern textile mills did not get their cotton from free labor. Also, "From

> North and South, free labor and slave labor That summary is overly simplistic. Northern textile mills did not get their cotton from free labor. Also, "From an economical standpoint, the emancipation in the West Indies and the general abolishment of slavery was a failure for Britain", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Cotton https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Cotton . Opinions of course differ: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_slave_trade#Effects_on_the_British_economy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_slave_trade#Effects_o... The US has non-free labor in the form of penal labor supplying some $10 billion in goods and services. Last I checked it was not being buried by countries with only free labor.

WalterBright 2y ago
> Northern textile mills did not get their cotton from free labor. The North continued to prosper after the war, and their economy was not based on textiles. They also imported Egyptian cotton.
- eesmith 2y ago
  That doesn't affect my point that the North and the South cannot so easily be described as free labor vs. slave labor. Just like how England didn't have slavery in the 1700s, but the English still profited from slavery elsewhere in the British Empire.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    The English would have profited more with free labor.
    - eesmith 2y ago
      Are you being deliberately obtuse? My objection is to how your description needless obscures that the North was a mixed economy based on mostly free by also decidedly slave labor. Surely you know there's a long history of Yankees taught that they were on the good side, because they didn't want anything to do with slavery, because that's the more comfortable history to teach, rather than the real history of how many Yankees profited off of slave-made goods, just like those English not-so-gentle-men still honored today whose wealth was built on the backs of black slaves. Surely you are also aware that apologists for the treasonous Confederacy say the Union should have just waited a few decades for slavery to reach its natural dead end, rather having all those poor white boys die for a few black folk. Given that knowledge, please try to not sound like a supporter of either false narrative.
roenxi 2y ago
> From an economical standpoint, the emancipation in the West Indies and the general abolishment of slavery was a failure for Britain That seems a bit light as sources go and I suggest someone is misinterpreting the data. The slave owners are obviously going to be worse off in the short term. They used to have slaves, now they have to do the work themselves or pay for it. That much is pretty straightforward to see. The issue is the slave owners are stuck in a local maximum where their society will be overwhelmed by the superior productivity of non-slave owning societies. There is a reason that none of the economic majors today are interested in re-instituting slavery - it is inefficient. The sort of thing you wish upon your enemies so that they can't challenge you. You'll note that after avoiding emancipation because of economic fears ... the economy of the South was then beaten up much worse than what happened to Britain! Which is what exactly what we'd expect to happen to the sort of state that commits to a system of slavery in a big way. It isn't going to be able to maintain a military edge.
- eesmith 2y ago
  The British slave owners received cash compensated from the government for taking their 'property'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Compensation_Act_1837 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Compensation_Act_1837 says 'The 1837 Act paid substantial amount of money constituting 40% of the Treasury’s tax receipts at the time to the former slave owners, but nothing to the liberated people.' The British government didn't pay off that debt until 2015. While it sounds like you think the slave owners didn't get enough short-term compensation? And don't just sob over the slavers. If the former slaves had gotten real and effective compensation, it would have been even more an economical failure for Britain. > re-instituting slavery - it is inefficient Please note that there are many types of non-free labor besides chattel slavery. I consider the penal labor system in the US a legalized form of slavery, while there are many who support it.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    It's a lot cheaper to pay off the slave owners than incur the deaths of 620,000 young men.
WalterBright 2y ago
> The US has non-free labor in the form of penal labor supplying some $10 billion in goods and services. The size of the US economy is $29 trillion. $10 billion does not define it.

WalterBright 2y ago

> Northern textile mills did not get their cotton from free labor. The North continued to prosper after the war, and their economy was not based on textiles. They also imported Egyptian cotton.

eesmith 2y ago
That doesn't affect my point that the North and the South cannot so easily be described as free labor vs. slave labor. Just like how England didn't have slavery in the 1700s, but the English still profited from slavery elsewhere in the British Empire.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  The English would have profited more with free labor.
  - eesmith 2y ago
    Are you being deliberately obtuse? My objection is to how your description needless obscures that the North was a mixed economy based on mostly free by also decidedly slave labor. Surely you know there's a long history of Yankees taught that they were on the good side, because they didn't want anything to do with slavery, because that's the more comfortable history to teach, rather than the real history of how many Yankees profited off of slave-made goods, just like those English not-so-gentle-men still honored today whose wealth was built on the backs of black slaves. Surely you are also aware that apologists for the treasonous Confederacy say the Union should have just waited a few decades for slavery to reach its natural dead end, rather having all those poor white boys die for a few black folk. Given that knowledge, please try to not sound like a supporter of either false narrative.

roenxi 2y ago

> From an economical standpoint, the emancipation in the West Indies and the general abolishment of slavery was a failure for Britain That seems a bit light as sources go and I suggest someone is misinterpreting the data. The slave owners are obviously going to be worse off in the short term. They used to have slaves, now they have to do the work themselves or pay for it. That much is pretty straightforward to see. The issue is the slave owners are stuck in a local maximum where their society will be overwhelmed by the superior productivity of non-slave owning societies. There is a reason that none of the economic majors today are interested in re-instituting slavery - it is inefficient. The sort of thing you wish upon your enemies so that they can't challenge you. You'll note that after avoiding emancipation because of economic fears ... the economy of the South was then beaten up much worse than what happened to Britain! Which is what exactly what we'd expect to happen to the sort of state that commits to a system of slavery in a big way. It isn't going to be able to maintain a military edge.

eesmith 2y ago
The British slave owners received cash compensated from the government for taking their 'property'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Compensation_Act_1837 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Compensation_Act_1837 says 'The 1837 Act paid substantial amount of money constituting 40% of the Treasury’s tax receipts at the time to the former slave owners, but nothing to the liberated people.' The British government didn't pay off that debt until 2015. While it sounds like you think the slave owners didn't get enough short-term compensation? And don't just sob over the slavers. If the former slaves had gotten real and effective compensation, it would have been even more an economical failure for Britain. > re-instituting slavery - it is inefficient Please note that there are many types of non-free labor besides chattel slavery. I consider the penal labor system in the US a legalized form of slavery, while there are many who support it.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  It's a lot cheaper to pay off the slave owners than incur the deaths of 620,000 young men.

WalterBright 2y ago

> The US has non-free labor in the form of penal labor supplying some $10 billion in goods and services. The size of the US economy is $29 trillion. $10 billion does not define it.