Portage: Path Dependence and Increasing Returns in U.S. History

Hoyt Bleakley and Jeffrey Lin

No 16314, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We examine portage sites in the U.S. South, Mid-Atlantic, and Midwest, including those on the fall line, a geomorphologic feature in the southeastern U.S. marking the final rapids on rivers before the ocean. Historically, waterborne transport of goods required portage around the falls at these points, while some falls provided water power during early industrialization. These factors attracted commerce and manufacturing. Although these original advantages have long since been made obsolete, we document the continuing--and even increasing--importance of these portage sites over time. We interpret this finding in a model with path dependence arising from local increasing returns to scale.

JEL-codes: F1 J1 N9 R1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010-08
Note: DAE EFG ITI
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (23)

Published as \Portage and Path Dependence." Quarterly Journal of Economics , May 2012, pp 587-644, joint work with Je rey Lin.

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.nber.org/papers/w16314.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Portage: path dependence and increasing returns in U.S. history (2010)
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:nbr:nberwo:16314

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
http://www.nber.org/papers/w16314

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().