Please refer to my second sentence.
BTW; One would think that the’high prices for slaves’ would have led ‘owners’ to treat them well.Better might be a better word.
Land depletion and mechanization?
Nonsense.
First, land is never permanently depleted, the only issue is how long to remain fallow between plantings, and what farm practices best reduce the fallow time.
Second, foreign agricultural workers today prove that when cheap labor is available, it drives out expensive mechanization.
Further, slavery was not simply economics, it was also cultural and the Southern Slave Power did what it must to maintain slavery's viability.
Finally, many slaves were hired out as industrial workers, and the 1857 Dred Scott decision implied such workers could be employed in non-slave States also.
So Dred Scott turned many Northern Democrats & Whigs into solid anti-slavery Republicans.
aumrl: " One would think that the’high prices for slaves’ would have led ‘owners’ to treat them well. Better might be a better word. "
I agree that expensive slaves were relatively well treated.
Many slave-holders at the time asserted their slaves were better off than Northern wage-workers.
True or not, the fact remained that wage-workers could always freely quit & move on, unlike slaves.