Did Slavery Benefit the US Economy?

Did the Southern states trail the North because slavery is bad for the economy?

WHEN writing about why Nordic countries still trail the US in GDP per capita I pointed to slavery as one of the factors. If you are curious about that claim, read my article discussing that subject more in detail: If Social Democracy Is So Great, Why Is the US Richer Than Nordics?

What I want to discuss in this story are some of the interesting counterpoints I got to that claim in the comment section. Historian David Wilson makes a good point:

Try visiting Charleston, South Carolina today. It is the city that most resembles what cities looked like in the 18th and 19th centuries. No skyscrapers… hardly any tall buildings at all. The principal city of the Deep South slave trade and the birth place of the Confederacy is an economic backwater even today.

What should we conclude from that? Rather than giving the US an edge over Nordic countries was slavery actually something that held back the development of the United States? I think the answer to that question is quite complex. I do believe slavery contributed to structural problems that the American South still struggles with. Problems that even America itself struggle with such as racism and the conflict between…