Investment in Fixed and Working Capital During Early Industrialization

Evidence From U.S. Manufacturing Firms

Bibliographic Data

ID10104785
AuthorsKenneth L Sokoloff (National Bureau of Economic Research, corresponding author)
Year1984
Volume44
Issue2
Pages545-556
Publication date1984-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Journal of Economic History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-0507 • E-ISSN: 1471-6372
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0022050700032125
OpenAlexW2011439769
LanguageEN
Citations received6

This paper utilizes a survey of U. S. manufacturing firms from 1832 to investigate the structure of manufacturing investment during early industrialization. The relative magnitudes of investments in fixed and working capital, and how they varied with firm size, location, and industry, are documented. This variation across industries in the composition of capital investments is indicative of a more general variation in factor intensities, and bears on the issues of why industries became concentrated in the regions they did, and the degrees to which they were adversely affected by the limited availability of long–term loans. Evidence that most manufacturing industries had quite modest investments in machinery and tools per unit of labor is also presented, serving to undercut the notion that the early period of industrialization was based on a proliferation of new, machinery–intensive technologies

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