Expropriation Without Compensation: Copper in Chile, 1970–1973

Sebastian Edwards

The World Economy, 2025, vol. 48, issue 6, 1237-1250

Abstract: In this essay, I analyse the nationalisation of large copper mines during Salvador Allende's socialist government in Chile in the 1970s. This is one of the earliest cases ‘nationalization without compensation’. Chile's legal argument was based on the novel idea that ‘adequate’ payment should be calculated as book value minus ‘excessive profits’. In turn, excessive profits were defined, for every year, as profits above 12% of book value. I analyse the economic arguments that led to nationalisation, and I deconstruct and critically evaluate the methodology used to calculate ‘excessive profits’ and ‘adequate compensation’. I analyse the US and multinationals' response to Chile's nationalisation policies. JEL Classification: B22, E52, E58, F31, F33.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/twec.13697

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:worlde:v:48:y:2025:i:6:p:1237-1250

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0378-5920

Access Statistics for this article

The World Economy is currently edited by David Greenaway

More articles in The World Economy from Wiley Blackwell
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().