Issue: Land Sales in the Colony of Vancouver Island
Date: 1853
- Imagine you are an economist, sent to the Colony of Vancouver Island on behalf of the British Colonial Office to investigate the slow pace of population growth. In particular you are to report on the workings of the Wakefield System of setting land prices. You are asked to prepare a briefing note for decision on the policy.
- Some questions to consider: What exactly is the system? How is supposed to work? Is it working as expected? Why or why not?
- Some options to consider: • Stay the course with the policy as enacted. • Revise the price charged. • Keep the price but revise the use of the revenue. • Abandon the system.
- USE THE TEMPLATE ON THE COURSESPACES PAGE: Please ensure that your name and V# is on the front page of your briefing note. Length should not exceed two pages. Holding constant information and clarity, brevity will count. One page is quite feasible.
- Resources: This is not primarily a research project, so I will provide some references to get you going. These could be sufficient; you can do additional reading if you wish. All should be available to you, at least signed into UVic.