Meanings
- economicsThe theory that land abundance and labor scarcity in the 19th-century United States led to high wages, which resulted in labor-saving technological innovations and the development of the American system of manufacturing based on the extensive use of machinery and interchangeable parts.
Synonyms: Habakkuk hypothesis, Rothbarth-Habakkuk thesis
Synonyms & antonyms
proper nounThe theory that land abundance and labor scarcity in the 19th-century United States led to high wages, which resulted in labor-saving technological innovations and the development of the American system of manufacturing based on the extensive use of machinery and interchangeable parts.
Origin
Proposed by John Habakkuk (1915–2002), British economic historian, in his work American and British Technology in the Nineteenth Century: The Search for Labour-Saving Inventions (1962).
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
Habakkuk thesis. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Habakkuk%20thesis
“Habakkuk thesis.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Habakkuk%20thesis. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Habakkuk thesis,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Habakkuk%20thesis.
Source: Habakkuk thesis on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.