In the first reading, Stanley Engerman and Kenneth Sokoloff attempt to explain what factors contributed to the different levels of economic development between the North American colonies and the Latin American colonies. They hypothesize that the United States and Canada were able to sustain economic growth due to factor endowments that were superior to those of Central and South America. Endowments such as climate, soil, and density of th

Although it is perhaps due to this very difference in scope, the two articles view the South and its relative economic prosperity very differently. In the first article, the authors discuss North-South diversions toward the conclusion. Some parallels are drawn between the South and the less prosperous Latin American colonies - large-scale agriculture with one main crop, high inequality, and an abundance of slave labor. However, the authors rather quickly dismiss the idea that the South differed much from the rest of the United States. They cite two reasons for why the South was actually more like the United States than its Latin American counterparts. First, the actual share of the overall population comprised by slaves was not as extreme as the Caribbean, for example. Second, the political and economic framework of the United States dominated the South and thus gave them an environment in which to flourish.

While these authors made it seem the North-South divide was not entirely significant, the second article focused solely on this divide. Coclanis spends the entire article contemplating the reasons for the sharp contrasts between the two regions, citing startling statistics to illustrate this contrast. Indeed, the discussion of the South in the second reading closely resembles the discussion of Latin America in the first essay. Coclanis focuses on the high level of slave labor, the reliance on large-scale agriculture, the unequal distribution or land, and the relative inequality as prime factors for the South's economic trends. Simultaneously, he discusses the North's diverse and flexible enterprise system, its non-reliance on slave labor, its equal distribution of wealth, and its relative equality. Thus, while in the first article the North and South are virtually one and the same, in the second article it seems they are depicted as night and day.

e native population, they say, predisposed certain colonies to accomplishing economic growth. Institutions and government policies such as land policies and trade regulations were also significant determining factors, but less so than factor endowments. After comparing the prosperous colonies to the less prosperous, the authors then briefly state differences within the United States colonies as far as economic growth is concerned. Numerous differences in the economic patterns of the North and the South are pointed out - indeed, in

Some common words found in the essay are:
North South, Engerman Sokoloff, Latin American, Colonies Coclanis, America Endowments, Latin America, United Canada, South Coclanis, United Overall, economic growth, , factor endowments, north south, american colonies, distribution wealth, latin american, slave labor, native population, equal distribution wealth, equal distribution, climate soil, latin american colonies, economic divergence north, divergence north south, colonies latin american,
Approximate Word count = 1630
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)