Most of the volunteer immigrants to the United States came from landless working class of England and the rest of Europe. Once given land, since they were doing all the work in Europe already for their landlords, they got to reap the benefits of their labor. Yes the United States was blessed with the best farmland near Iowa and central California, iron mines in Minnesota, silver and gold out west, steel-making out in Ohio or Pennsylvania near the large coal deposits. Man was considered an individual, not a sacrificial animal to the State or kings. Solid commodity money and government generally doing what they are suppose to. Limited with no income or sales taxes with a large part of revenues from alcohol sin taxes.

They got really bigger after the WW2. The other major country was in very bad position due to the war. Except the soviet union. With this position they have been able to take over a lot of country in an imperialism way.

Why?

Imagine an island where all the men spend all their time spear fishing and all the women spend all their time cleaning and cooking their man’s fish. Then introduce technology in the form of a fishing net and enhanced productivity in the form of an assembly line to prepare the fish. Now half the men’s time can be devoted to other productive activities like building huts, and half the women’s time can now be devoted to other productive activities like making clothes. Abracadabra, the island’s GDP and effective wealth doubles.

except when, half of them are stupid (a.k.a. as no masters in usefull skillset)... so half work in , and other half are unemployed and advocate for legalizing weed so they can experience a little bit of happiness

progress is only good if you can progress along with it....

Rule of Law and Laissez Fair capitalism.

Dvaut seems to have had the best answer so far.

Natural resources, slavery, acquisition of land from Indians had nothing to do it with it really. Many other countries have natural resources and are poor, many other countries had/have slavery and are poor. Many countries stole land from the indigenous peoples and are poor.

Hong Kong which is a tiny island with no agriculture, hass almost no natural resources other than a safe harbour and became immensely wealthy and had both sustained economic growth and development because the British who colonized the island established Rule of Law and Laissez fair capitalism.

Puritan work ethic, nationalistic pride, national ethos for individualism, creativity and imagination, getting great immigrants.

Freedom yo

Among the most naive posts in 2+2 forum history. But then, this is the economics forum, were endless false assumptions are like gospel.

Just "having" those things , obviously doesn't do it alone. You've got to be able to harness the "benefits" they provide for your economic system.

Mmmmkay, now imagine where the U.S. would be today if it never stole land, never reaped the benefit of two centuries of free labor and never harnessed the lightest, most efficient crude in the world.

It would still be a prosperous 1st world country. No doubt in my mind.

Jiggs,

How did Hong Kong enjoy economic growth and development when they didn't have oil, didn't have slaves, and didn't steal land from the Indians?

is was a British arbitrage hub into china and far east

note that HSBC actually got it's London banking license in return for moving money back to London

That's right. Trade. And what fosters trade?

cheap oil price

A barrell of oil could be $50 tomorrow. If you don't have rule of law and/or don't allow people the freedom to make the economic choices that are in their benefit. Trade would come to a standstill.

Look at Venezuela. The pay literally almost nothing for gasoline, because it is so subsidized by the government.

They don't have rule of law and the government has open hostility to free market capitalism. The result? The people struggle to find chicken, meat, butter, eggs, and even toilet paper. Their economy is crashing and the outlook is very bleak. Cheap oil has little to do with making an economy grow and develop.

I thought this thread was about the US?

This doesn't discount what jiggs said.

b

No, it couldn't possibly be.

Though maybe .... after a month of demand-crushing recession/depression brought on by high prices in the first place. ... Maybe.

You have very few economic choices without cheap energy. Period, end sentence.

We're seeing the onset of that today with endless TARP, QEx, bailouts, federal bond-buying, defaults and pension drains.

If it's subsidized, then obv. it's not as cheap as you are trying to suggest.

Though, I do notice the clockwork-like suggestion that a leftist regime is what curtails your notion of economic prosperity.

No meddling from the West there, though.

Give operatives a few dozen million to buy student protestors' rage, and stand back and yell "fly, my pretties!" But nah, the U.S. would never engage in that.

You, like all soft science disciples who put cart (finance) before horse (energy) - as if freedom can just buy more oilz - don't appear to know what you're talking about.

I stand firmly by what I said. There are a number of factors that keep U.S. power structures well-greased, including mind-boggling levels of corruption and waste, near-zero oversight, and isolation from the affects of world wars ... But the U.S. wouldn't be 1/10th the empire it is today without genocidal land grab all the way to the pacific ocean, unparalleled exploitation of slave labor for 2-3 centuries, and cheap, abundant (well, used to be) natural resources.

Pointing to how that couldn't be the case by presenting false equivalencies of other nation's failures does not change that argument at all.

Yes it does. Economics doesn't work one way in the U.S and a completely different way on the other side of the planet. Hong Kong is an example that you don't need slaves, 3,000 square miles of land, or super cheap abundant energy to be successful.

It was a hypothetical statement. Used to make a point.


Economiccs choices become harder no doubt, but as long as there is Rule of Law, (which includes property rights), and free trade, people will be able to adjust. They will drive less, they will buy more efficient cars, they will spend less on luxuries, people will come up with different manners of transportation, they will live closer to their work, etc, etc, etc When oil had that tremendous rise in price a couple of years ago, gasoline consumption in the U.S slowed down and even remained steady.


For someone obsessed about oil, you seem to not want to know anything about one of the countries that is a major producer of it.

The Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA produces the oil, the government uses the sale of the oil to subsidie gasoline prices, the people there paid 12c a gallon last time I was there 2 years ago.

There are fewer countries in the world that have more of an abundance of cheap energy. Why is Venezuela so poor? Because the U..S has meddled? Oh please.


That's what leftists regimes do. I'm glad we can agree that it is not really a constitutional democracy anymore.


Yeah because the only way anyone would want to protest a government that has enabled the highest inflation in latin america, shut down an independent media, packed the supreme court, and which has caused shortages in almost any major food staple is if they are paid by the U.S. Give me a break.

Economics is not an exact science, one must look for examples in other countries and scenarios to see how one thing influences another.

If cheap oil/energy were the #1 thing that mattered above all else. Venezuela would be the most prosperous country in Latin America. One of the most prosperous in the world! Sadly, that is not the case.

China is what American libertarians have wet dreams of. It's a place where unfortunate distractions like freedom, democracy, workers rights or fair wages can't interfere with the grand plans and schemes of the 'wealth creators'. It's a place where a free market isn't necessary, as the government will do your bidding for you and stamp down anyone who gets in your way. It's a place without dissent, disagreement or choice. All of these things that stop America from unlocking it's potential and being great. China is the land of Atlas.

Let's say that the U.S consisted of only the 13 states that evolved from the 13 colonies, and never had slaves. The U.S would still be a 1st world country. Why? because the colonists that formed this country were educated, they had skills, there was rule of law, they enabled property rights, and free trade.

These are what make a country wealthy. These are the factors you will find consistent in any developed country. Go ahead look at any poor country. Name anyone you want. I guarantee it is missing one of those free factors. Rule of law, property rights, and/or free trade (the right to make economic decisions for themselves).

Venezuela Is Struggling With A Historic Food Shortage

This picture is sooo perfect.




Venezuela food shortages: 'No one can explain why a rich country has no food'

Lack of free trade and no property rights won't make up for all the cheap oil in the world.

this

cheap energy source (like crude or slaves) -> high requirement for economic success
free trade -> requirement for economic success
incentives (like property rights) -> requirement for economic success

you are fighting over weighting of those parameters, pointless

HK had/has cheap energy source -> china labor

If one puts their model in a vacuum, sure. Again, because another country did it differently doesn't discount what jiggs has said.

You're also greatly simplifying Hong Kong's history.

b

Economics isn't a science at all. If there was actual science in economics, you would have a controlled experiment isolating for specific testable hypothesis, which we do not have. There is just a bunch of conjecture.

Clearly cheap energy has a string impact on economic output but energy comes in many forms and an economy is a lot more complicated than just energy inputs -> products.

You can do scientific experiments in economics. As a student, I was paid to be a part of many of them. It's not easy and obviously you can't really do it with national economies. But you can compare data, control for certain for variable and use case studies to test a hypothesis.

I would argue that it does. Jiggs seems to be implying that if it were not for cheap oil, slaves, and land stolen from Indians, the United States would not be a developed country. Hong Kong is an example that those 3 factors are not necessary for an area to enjoy economic growth and development.

Yes, I am greatly simplifying Hong Kong's history, no doubt Chinese immigrants to the island after Great Britain colonized the island contributed to it's success. But many other countries in the world have cheap labor.

Those Chinese laborers migrated to the island because they knew Britain was at the center of global trade and that they would enjoy private property rights and the freedom to make their own economic choices.