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While urban economics is concerned with the location patterns of households, firms, and other entities which locate in densely developed areas, it also encompasses such considerations as (1) how the patterns of location evolve and change, (2) how the patterns of location are affected by government expenditures, taxes, and regulations, and (3) how the patterns of location affect the economic performance of both firms and households (Mills, 1985). The composition of the population of any given community is a significant factor in the determination of the mix of the publicly provided goods in that community. Conversely, government may develop a specific mix of publicly provided goods with an intention of attracting and manipulating a population mix for an area. Road improvements, as an example, may make it possible for more people to locate in a specific area, because access between that area and major job location centers is facilitated by the improved roads. The westward expansion of the United States was "initiated by traders, explorers, pioneer settlers, and, not least of all, by the military à" (Hill, 1957, p. vii). In the first-half of the nineteenth century, however, the westward expansion of the country was given added impetus by governmental actionsù both federal and stateùdesigned to speed the development of the nation's transportation system (Goodrich, 1960). |
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Historian Charles Beard (1913) argued that the Constitution of the United States is basically an economic document. To support his contention, he drew heavily on The Federalist, and other writings by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. When the Constitution was being drafted, Madison pressed for congressional authority to grant corporate charters (Freund, Sutherland, Howe, & Brown, 1967). This move was defeated, and authority to grant corporate charters remained with the states. The right of corporations to exist without undue state interference, however, was not yet established. Two significant judicial cases established this right. In 1819, Chief Justice John Marshall classified corporate charters as contracts, and the provisions of such charters as obligations which state legislatures could not impair. In 1837, Chief Justice Taney determined that, where a corporate charter contained no express provision against the granting of a competitive franchise, the granting of a charter to a competitor was not an impairment of the contract expressed in the original charter.Rapidly growing demand also played a major role in the growth of the cotton textile industry in the American south. The increase in demand was both foreign and domestic in origin. Domestically, the factors contributing to an increase in the demand for cotton textile goods produced in the American south were (1) import substitutionùthe availability of American produced cotton textile goods as competitors for imported competitors, (2) the growth of per capita income in the United States, which increased the capability of Americans to buy cotton textile goods, (3) an increasing American population, with a consequent increase in the overall demand for cotton textile goods, (4) a shift in the distribution of the American population to urban and western areas (wherein access to home spinning was far more restricted than in the rural areas of the north and south, from which people migrat |
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