Let us say your 54% number is correct, does this look correct in terms of the money distribution?
You are giving the Confederate South credit for much more than it deserves, while failing to list exports for other areas of the country.
My post #248 includes a link to one source of data on US imports & exports of that period (see page 605).
It shows exports of goods as $334 million in 1860, while net of specie was another $58 million.
I assume that represents gold & silver from new mines out west.
This links shows a simplistic graphic of exports & imports at the time, with total exports put at $316 million.
For a detailed breakdown of what those exports were, see this link, referred to as the Hanson tables.
Hanson tables show raw cotton exports as $192 million, which is 54% of $357 total exports.
rustbucket: "I'm not sure where your 1863 figure comes from. Source please. "
Sadly, this link is incomplete, but does give some idea as to what was going on.
It shows:
Yes, some of that is inflation, but the real driver is growth in total GDP, from $4.3 billion in 1860 to nearly $10 billion in 1865.
Again, my point in all this is that while cotton was certainly important to the US economy in 1860, within just a few years the US had learned to get along just fine without it.
Cotton turned out to be less of an economic weapon than Confederates had believed it would be.
Finally, in my post #248 above I put 1860 exports at $357 million, which is a number I'd developed based on other sources, but which can be verified by these sources if we simply discount species exports by half.
Why discount species exports?
Well, like you, I'm not 100% comfortable with them, don't fully understand what the term means.
Anyway, that's how I get cotton exports down from your claim of 70% to a much more realistic roughly 55% of total US exports in 1860.
Let us say your 54% number is correct, does this look correct in terms of the money distribution?
And what would be those, and where did you find them?
You: My post #248 includes a link....It shows exports of goods as $334 million in 1860, while net of specie was another $58 million.
I assume that represents gold & silver from new mines out west.
It was metals but source is not listed in your tables.
Your data of $334 is wrong. Actual export value of US goods (from US Treasury report) was $316 million. Your data table has likely included the value of re-exports which is valid for their bookkeeping but not for your North/South comparisons. Your second link showing the lower figure of $316 is correct for US exports that year.
You: For a detailed breakdown of what those exports were, see this link, referred to as the Hanson tables.
Hanson tables show raw cotton exports as $192 million, which is 54% of $357 total exports.
Hanson lists exports by type. Your figure is cotton and does not include Southern exports of tobacco, food, semi-finished cotton goods, chemicals, hemp, or the proportional value of finished cotton.
DeBow and Kettel have done excellent work on pulling together the entire data listings. That data shows the Southern contributions to export value in the 75 to 87#% range depending on year.
Then you launch off on whether to count specie. It was precious metals used as payment for something. Nothing in the your data tables says to whom or for what. The statistical tables from Treasury records do break out by source such as foreign countries transshipping through US ports.
So, you see, that has to be factored out because it was not sourced production.