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The Service Sector in the United States, 1839 to 1899

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 February 2011

Thomas Weiss
Affiliation:
University of Kansas

Extract

The dissertation is a study of the service industries in the United States during the period 1839 through 1899. The primary purpose of the study is to provide three series relating to the quantitative development of the sector. These series—value-added, gainful workers, and capital stock—provide benchmark estimates at decade intervals centered on census years. Series are presented for the aggregate sector; the major components, final and intermediate services; and eight industries. These eight industries, defined as the service sector, are trade, transportation and public utilities, finance and insurance, professional services, personal services, government, education, and the independent hand trades.

Type
Obstacles to Economic Growth: Papers presented at the Twenty-Seventh Annual Meeting of the Economic History Association
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1967

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References

1 “Changes in the Composition of Manpower since the Civil War,” Studies in Income and Wealth, Vol. 11 (New York: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1949).Google ScholarPubMed

2 If the prices of services behaved as did the general price level, service output would have increased at an average of 52 per cent per decade; slightly slower than in current prices.

3 Empirically the dichotomy is imprecise, but not highly so. I have handled output by government and professional services as flowing to consumers, while that for banking and utilities has been included with the intermediate services.

I have used value of output and not value-added in this discussion. The comparisons are made using deflated series.