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The Mystery of Property Rights: A U.S. Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 June 2011

Naomi R. Lamoreaux
Naomi R. Lamoreaux*
Affiliation:
Professor of Economics and History, Yale University, 27 Hillhouse Avenue, New Haven, CT 06520-8269; and Research Associate, NBER. E-mail: naomi.lamoreaux@yale.edu.
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Abstract

Economic development requires both secure property rights and the ability to reallocate property in response to technological and other changes. Significant reallocations have occurred repeatedly throughout U.S. history and have often been involuntary. This essay considers the question of how property rights can be subject to frequent involuntary reallocation and still be considered secure.

“Upon the sacredness of property civilization itself depends—the right of the laborer to his hundred dollars in the savings bank, and equally the legal right of the millionaire to his millions.”1

Andrew Carnegie

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ARTICLES
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The Journal of Economic History , Volume 71 , Issue 2 , 06 June 2011 , pp. 275 - 306
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 2011

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