The origins and development of the American economy : an introduction to economics / by E.A.J. Johnson and Herman E. Krooss.

Includes index.

Part I. The Origins of our basic economic institutions by E.A.J. Johnson : 1. Economic activity and economic development -- 2. The last medieval background -- 3. Emergence of capitalism -- 4. Beginnings of scientific technology -- 5. Formulation of capitalist theory -- 6. Protection and the transplantation of industrialism -- 7. Export of capital and the genesis of economic imperialism --

Part II. The Development of the American Economy by Herman E. Krooss : 8. Growing benefits of a widening and deepening technology -- 9. Growth of business enterprise and the increasing importance of corporate management -- 10. Labor's progress -- 11. How agriculture evolved from a way of life to a business -- 12. Adapting financial institutions to economic development -- 13. Expansion of the government's economic influence -- 14. Wastes of war -- 15. Evolution of American economic thought.

"Where did this system of production come from? How was it gradually put together into an integrated whole? Why did it reach its most effective development in the United States rather than on some other continent? These are the major questions this book will try to answer. The first part traces the origins of our basic economic institutions. ... Part II analyses in more detail the process of adaptation of borrowed institutions to American needs, and describes how new techniques were added to heritage America received from Europe. It should be stressed that if is not our purpose to tell the detailed story of American economic growth. It is rather to appraise the nature of the most important parts of our economic system and to explain why this combination of instrumentalities has made it possible for the minor fraction of the world's population living in the United States to produce such a major fraction of global output...." -- from the Preface.

From the library of Karl and Elizabeth Niebyl.