In what ways was the economy of the New South different from and similar to the economy of the past?

While many
economic changes happened in the period referred to as the New South, racial segregation and
abusive labor practices for poor and especially black people are still a major hallmark of the
era. Jim Crow laws and "separate but equal" policies worked to keep black people from
accessing economic or political resources and kept massive numbers of black people in jail where
the 13th amendment worked hand-in-hand with convict leasing systems to keep a huge number of
black people suffering under systems of captivity and forced labor.

The
primary changes that did occur were in the forms of labor people participated in. Plantation
labor transformed from slavery into the nearly identical "sharecropping," but
factories were also built, and mining operations and railroads expanded tremendously. Many poor
descendants of rural settlers, who did have land, were also coerced during this time by factory
and mining operations, which worked to move them to cities or company towns. This
created...