Replies

DiogenesLamp: ""Your fancy graphic showing where the money was getting collected is dominated by New York. Do you think New York alone earned all that money from their own exports?"

PeaRidge: "You are correct.
That diagram only shows the point of collection of the tariff charges.
The only diagram that would have any relevance here would be point of consumer payment or consumption of goods."

My post #590 addresses this issue with the best data I can find.

Around 1859 cotton represented 54% of US exports, tobacco another 4%.
The rest was Northern and western agricultural and manufactured products.

So it's clear the South contributed more than it's "fair share" to total US exports, but it's not clear if the resulting imports were really paid for by Southern cotton growers.

To cite a simple example: suppose a Southern cotton grower buys a machine (i.e., railroad or steamship equipment) manufactured in the North.
Now suppose that with money earned building this machine, the Northern employees go out and buy something imported from Europe, on which they pay a duty to Uncle Sam.

So, who do we say ultimately "paid the duty", those northern employees, or the Southern cotton grower?
Seems to me that for you to claim the cotton grower was somehow wronged because Northerners used some of his money to buy imports, and paid a duty, is a bit... well... far fetched.

Do you disagree? "

Well, of course.

"My post #590 addresses this issue with the best data I can find.

The data you quoted was wrong for your purposes. I suppose you used the "best you could find" but what you used was data from the US Treasury....we know this because in their reports, they were on the July to June fiscal schedule. The US Treasury always published gross export data that included reexports of goods from Central and South America that made a stop in the United States.

If you had used US Dept. of Commerce data they would have given you the correct data to compute the percentage of Southern goods to totals.

Around 1859 cotton represented 54% of US exports, tobacco another 4%. The rest was Northern and western agricultural and manufactured products.

So it's clear the South contributed more than it's "fair share" to total US exports, but it's not clear if the resulting imports were really paid for by Southern cotton growers.

Using your numbers, 20% of the population providing 58% of the exports sounds very lopsided. My point about product going out has to balance money coming in is still valid.

You've admitted to 54% going out, so are we to believe that the South is paying 54% of the tariffs or are the Northern products so much more valuable that they constitute the bulk of the income?

To cite a simple example: suppose a Southern cotton grower buys a machine (i.e., railroad or steamship equipment) manufactured in the North. Now suppose that with money earned building this machine, the Northern employees go out and buy something imported from Europe, on which they pay a duty to Uncle Sam.

So, who do we say ultimately "paid the duty", those northern employees, or the Southern cotton grower?

There was no doubt some of that. But was it the dominant occurrence? Somehow 54% has to come back in money or products, and if it comes back in money it has to eventually come back in products when they spend the money.

The South was apparently ending up with quite a lot of European Money, and some how the tariffs on European products had to be paid out of that chunk of money.