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Appealing for Liberty: Freedom Suits in the South by Loren Schweninger (review)

Appealing for Liberty: Freedom Suits in the South by Loren Schweninger (review) involving short- and long-term efficiencies and valuations. Efficiency max - imization was a dynamic, long-term problem; it was not a one-off con - test between hard-driving master and resistant slave over any given day’s picking rate. Excessive punishments and overwork one day might reduce the value of the planter’s property the next day more than they increase output on the one day. High mortality on Jamaica’s sugar plantations may account for Jamaica’s lesser interest in slave values, and shorter horizons may explain the greater brutality associated with sugar work. My quibble with Rosenthal is with her repeated reference to slaves as “human capital” when, in fact, they were “human” capital. This is no fine distinction. Economists view human capital as investments people make in themselves—education, health, good habits, and so forth—that increase productivity and earnings. It is called human capital because people can- not be separated from their investments in the same way they can be sep- arated from their physical and financial assets. Thus, “human capital” is rented by employers with wage payments in at-will labor markets. Slaves had “human capital,” of course; they learned how to be productive. But the “human” capital Rosenthal refers to was, from http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The Journal of the Civil War Era University of North Carolina Press

Appealing for Liberty: Freedom Suits in the South by Loren Schweninger (review)

Milewski, Melissa
The Journal of the Civil War Era , Volume 9 (4) – Dec 5, 2019
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Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
Copyright
Copyright @ The University of North Carolina Press
ISSN
2159-9807

Abstract

involving short- and long-term efficiencies and valuations. Efficiency max - imization was a dynamic, long-term problem; it was not a one-off con - test between hard-driving master and resistant slave over any given day’s picking rate. Excessive punishments and overwork one day might reduce the value of the planter’s property the next day more than they increase output on the one day. High mortality on Jamaica’s sugar plantations may account for Jamaica’s lesser interest in slave values, and shorter horizons may explain the greater brutality associated with sugar work. My quibble with Rosenthal is with her repeated reference to slaves as “human capital” when, in fact, they were “human” capital. This is no fine distinction. Economists view human capital as investments people make in themselves—education, health, good habits, and so forth—that increase productivity and earnings. It is called human capital because people can- not be separated from their investments in the same way they can be sep- arated from their physical and financial assets. Thus, “human capital” is rented by employers with wage payments in at-will labor markets. Slaves had “human capital,” of course; they learned how to be productive. But the “human” capital Rosenthal refers to was, from

Journal

The Journal of the Civil War Era – University of North Carolina Press

Published: Dec 5, 2019

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