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> The US saw 60% real wage growth from 1860-1890 with no empire whatsoever I understand what you mean. But also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_destiny

> The US saw 60% real wage growth from 1860-1890 with no empire whatsoever I understand what you mean. But also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_destiny https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifest_destiny You are right that common people in Britain didn't get as much out of Pax Brittanica as America's did during its own period of expansion.

rayiner 10mo ago
Quite a different situation. An empire is when you go to a populated place and extract wealth from the people who live there. That’s not what manifest destiny was. America expanded into land that was sparsely populated by natives americans and mexico who had no wealth to extract.
- triceratops 10mo ago
  The wealth was in and on the land.
  - rayiner 10mo ago
    [flagged]
    - triceratops 10mo ago
      Were they poor? Is there evidence that Native Americans didn't have enough food, clothing, shelter, or handcrafted goods for everyone before colonists came? The land was rich and they were quite skilled at making a living off it. If you're calling them poor because they didn't have as much as the colonists, and that was bad, then perhaps income and wealth inequality today is just as problematic.
- wqaatwt 10mo ago
  > expanded into land that was sparsely populated Yes, that’s exactly the situation that results in highest income/wealth per capita. As long as that land can be utilized productively.
  - rayiner 10mo ago
    That last sentence is doing all the work though. North American indians lived on the largest continuous region of agricultural land in the world, connected with perhaps the best river network, and never had above subsistence levels of wealth per capita.
    - triceratops 10mo ago
      It's hard to farm all that land when there are no horses to pull a plow, or pigs, cows, or sheep to raise for meat and milk and wool and manure. They didn't have all the crops that colonists crossed over with either: wheat, rice, and soybeans. The only crop of comparable productivity was corn, which was domesticated in South and Central America and had to be adapted to North America over many generations. After they crossed the Bering Strait they also didn't receive any of the subsequent Old World advances in metallurgy, agriculture, chemistry, societal organization and so forth. It's asking quite a lot of a relatively small population base to invent all those things independently while also lacking everything necessary to have comparable agricultural yields. There was no Silk Road bringing gunpowder and paper and the Black Death to these societies. That means the native populations colonists encountered were the survivors of utterly cataclysmic epidemics. It's like if aliens brought a virus to Earth that killed 95% of the population and then they went "Hmm...these earthlings, they're not terribly productive are they?" I'm not an anthropologist or an economist or a historian so there are many other factors I missed.
- arethuza 10mo ago
  "America expanded into land that was sparsely populated" What does this remind you of?
- r_hoods_ghost 10mo ago
  It wasn't sparsely populated until you murdered everyone

rayiner 10mo ago

Quite a different situation. An empire is when you go to a populated place and extract wealth from the people who live there. That’s not what manifest destiny was. America expanded into land that was sparsely populated by natives americans and mexico who had no wealth to extract.

triceratops 10mo ago
The wealth was in and on the land.
- rayiner 10mo ago
  [flagged]
  - triceratops 10mo ago
    Were they poor? Is there evidence that Native Americans didn't have enough food, clothing, shelter, or handcrafted goods for everyone before colonists came? The land was rich and they were quite skilled at making a living off it. If you're calling them poor because they didn't have as much as the colonists, and that was bad, then perhaps income and wealth inequality today is just as problematic.
wqaatwt 10mo ago
> expanded into land that was sparsely populated Yes, that’s exactly the situation that results in highest income/wealth per capita. As long as that land can be utilized productively.
- rayiner 10mo ago
  That last sentence is doing all the work though. North American indians lived on the largest continuous region of agricultural land in the world, connected with perhaps the best river network, and never had above subsistence levels of wealth per capita.
  - triceratops 10mo ago
    It's hard to farm all that land when there are no horses to pull a plow, or pigs, cows, or sheep to raise for meat and milk and wool and manure. They didn't have all the crops that colonists crossed over with either: wheat, rice, and soybeans. The only crop of comparable productivity was corn, which was domesticated in South and Central America and had to be adapted to North America over many generations. After they crossed the Bering Strait they also didn't receive any of the subsequent Old World advances in metallurgy, agriculture, chemistry, societal organization and so forth. It's asking quite a lot of a relatively small population base to invent all those things independently while also lacking everything necessary to have comparable agricultural yields. There was no Silk Road bringing gunpowder and paper and the Black Death to these societies. That means the native populations colonists encountered were the survivors of utterly cataclysmic epidemics. It's like if aliens brought a virus to Earth that killed 95% of the population and then they went "Hmm...these earthlings, they're not terribly productive are they?" I'm not an anthropologist or an economist or a historian so there are many other factors I missed.
arethuza 10mo ago
"America expanded into land that was sparsely populated" What does this remind you of?
r_hoods_ghost 10mo ago
It wasn't sparsely populated until you murdered everyone