economic history link roundup, 1/9/12

A cartoon, yes, but still -- too simplistic?
Source http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAchild.htm 

Remembering Katrina Honeymoon, late historian of women and children's labor in Industrial England. "'It remains an inconvenient truth,' she observed in 2010, 'that most working-class children (and therefore most children) in 18th- and 19th-century Britain did not enjoy the freedom to develop physically and mentally through play and education.'"

Healthcare? Technology? Infrastructure? The Japanese economy has far from stagnated over the last 20 years. "The Myth of Japan's Failure", an NYT opinion piece, fills us in on the details.

The "Lawyers, Guns, and Money" blog continue their excellent "this day in labor history" series with a look at the passing of NAFTA. They also recently won a blogging award for this series.

A great essay on Southern politics during the Cold War (from the "Lenin's Tomb" blog): "racial populism could become a recurring form of Southern politics thanks in part to the defeat and co-optation of turn-of-the-[20th ]century Southern multiracial populism."

Historicizing American Conservatism. "Alan Brinkley raises the question of how to think about the attraction of conservatism to people who are, as he puts it, perched precariously in the middle class. The recent rise of economic inequality, he suggests, may actually have led to the embrace of an antigovernment, antitax politics by middle-class and working-class people, who, facing stagnation of their incomes and living standards, have grown frustrated with a state that seems increasingly incapable of aiding them. The erosion of government...has not led to a call for more government, but rather to a sense of the impotence of the state and a deep pessimism about the possibilities of government activism, and a feeling of resentment about rising tax burdens that yield few tangible benefits (pp. 772-773)".