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The Optimal Tax on Antebellum U.S. Cotton Exports

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  • Douglas A. Irwin

Abstract

The United States produced about 80 percent of the world's cotton in the decades prior to the Civil War. How much monopoly power did the United States possess in the world cotton market and what would have been the effect of an optimal export tax? This paper estimates the elasticity of foreign demand for U.S. cotton exports and uses the elasticity in a simple partial equilibrium model to calculate the optimal export tax and its effect on prices, trade, and welfare. The results indicate that the export demand elasticity for U.S. cotton was about -1.7 and that the optimal export tax of about 50 percent would have raised U.S. welfare by about $6 million, about 0.1 percent of U.S. GDP or about 0.5 percent of the South's GDP.

Suggested Citation

  • Douglas A. Irwin, 2001. "The Optimal Tax on Antebellum U.S. Cotton Exports," NBER Working Papers 8689, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:8689
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    Cited by:

    1. Marc Weidenmier, 2004. "Gunboats, Reputation, and Sovereign Repayment: Lessons from the Southern Confederacy," NBER Working Papers 10960, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Waschik, Robert & Fraser, Iain, 2007. "A computable general equilibrium analysis of export taxes in the Australian wool industry," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 712-736, July.
    3. Allen, Robert C., 2014. "American Exceptionalism as a Problem in Global History," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(2), pages 309-350, June.
    4. David Chilosi & Giovanni Federico, 2021. "The effects of market integration during the first globalization: a multi-market approach," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 25(1), pages 20-58.
    5. Weidenmier, Marc D., 2005. "Gunboats, reputation, and sovereign repayment: lessons from the Southern Confederacy," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 407-422, July.
    6. Burger, Kees, 2008. "Optimal export taxes – the case of cocoa in Cote d'Ivoire," 107th Seminar, January 30-February 1, 2008, Sevilla, Spain 6395, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    7. Giovanni Federico & Antonio Tena‐Junguito, 2017. "Lewis revisited: tropical polities competing on the world market, 1830–1938," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 70(4), pages 1244-1267, November.
    8. Steinwender, Claudia, 2013. "Information Frictions and the Law of One Price: “When the States and the Kingdom became United”," CEPREMAP Working Papers (Docweb) 1314, CEPREMAP.
    9. Thales Zamberlan Pereira, 2021. "Taxation and the stagnation of cotton exports in Brazil, 1800–60," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(2), pages 522-545, May.
    10. Raimondos, Pascalis & Woodland, Alan, 2018. "Reciprocity in trade negotiations and welfare," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 134-142.
    11. Zhe Chen & Zhongzhong Hu & Kai Li, 2021. "The spillover effect of trade policy along the value Chain: Evidence from China's rare earth‐related sectors," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(12), pages 3550-3582, December.
    12. Claudia Steinwender, 2018. "Real Effects of Information Frictions: When the States and the Kingdom Became United," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(3), pages 657-696, March.
    13. Marcelo de Paiva Abreu & Felipe Tamega Fernandes, 2005. "Market Power and Commodity Prices: Brazil, Chile and the United States, 1820s-1930," Textos para discussão 511, Department of Economics PUC-Rio (Brazil).
    14. Marc D. Weidenmier & Kim Oosterlinck, 2007. "Victory or Repudiation? The Probability of the Southern Confederacy Winning the Civil War," NBER Working Papers 13567, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Toshinobu Matsuda, 2005. "Differential Demand Systems: A Further Look at Barten's Synthesis," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 71(3), pages 607-619, January.
    16. Toshinobu Matsuda, 2007. "Linearizing the inverse quadratic almost ideal demand system," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(3), pages 381-396.
    17. Ying Lin & Henry W. Kinnucan, 2020. "The optimal export tax for a primary commodity in a vertical market," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 51(6), pages 909-922, November.
    18. León, Sonia M. & Roitman, Mauricio E. & Romero, Carlos A., 2009. "Evaluación de los efectos de la remoción de medidas para-arancelarias sobre las exportaciones argentinas de productos textiles [Assessing the efects of eliminating non-tariff barriers over the Arge," MPRA Paper 17898, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Joseph Davis & Vanguard Group; Christopher Hanes, 2004. "Primary Sector Shocks and Early American Industrialization," 2004 Meeting Papers 154, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    20. Devadoss, Stephen, 2008. "An Evaluation of Canadian and U.S. Policies of Log and Lumber Markets," Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics, Southern Agricultural Economics Association, vol. 40(1), pages 1-14, April.
    21. Douglas A. Irwin & Maksym G. Chepeliev, 2020. "The Economic Consequences of Sir Robert Peel: A Quantitative Assessment of the Repeal of the Corn Laws," NBER Working Papers 28142, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

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    JEL classification:

    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade
    • N3 - Economic History - - Labor and Consumers, Demography, Education, Health, Welfare, Income, Wealth, Religion, and Philanthropy

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