Yes it is. 
It sounds like Turchin is hedging his bets. In his manuscript for his new book on the secular cycle in America he has the Civil War as a mid-cycle conflict, that is one that did not solve the problem of elite overproduction and start a new secular cycle. But here is makes the case that elite overproduction was very much the case in the run up to the Civil War. As I see it the Civil War destroyed one category of elites, Southern slaveowners, every bit as effectively as William the Conqueror eliminated Saxon elites. That is the Civil War solved the problem of elite proliferation for the times. Industrial elites (e.g. Robber Barons) were not (yet) a major factor in 1860, a majority of the workforce were still farmers.
![[Image: figure4.jpg]](https://www.measuringworth.com/images/slavery/figure4.jpg)
The figure above shows the value of a slave in terms of economic impact (that is, what would impact politics). A major plantation owner with 500 slaves would hold wealth of about $150 million in 1837, and when you add land it would be about $250 million. In comparison the single largest fortune at the time (a Northerner I believe) I estimate at $6 billion in 2011. There were 13 slaveowners with 500 or more slaves in 1860. I suspect the situation was similar to today. The richest northerners were those like Bill Gates or the tech billionaires who got rich in the hot new industry of the time and did not exercise political power in proportion to their wealth. Thus, although a dozen "quarter billionaires" did not collectively posses the money of the richest northerners, the latter were probably more disengaged for politics, whereas the Southern elites, like the Koch brothers, were plugged in. As a result the South was dominant politically for longer than their relative wealth would suggest (look at how many early presidents hailed from the South). By 1860 they were seriously outnumbered both in terms of elite numbers and elite wealth (clout), however and politics went the culturally Northern way.
The Civil War saw the complete destruction of the Southern elite as a class. When you take the impact of slavery into account, as I have done below but which many scholars have not, you can see a distinct reduction in inequality (although short-lived) after the Civil War.
![[Image: Amer-sec-cycles.gif]](http://mikebert.neocities.org/Amer-sec-cycles.gif)
If I am correct, this means that Turchins's secular cycle corresponds to the S&H generational cycle, which was not the case for the agrarian era. In this case, having an understanding of the saeculum can provide insights that Turchin does not have.
It sounds like Turchin is hedging his bets. In his manuscript for his new book on the secular cycle in America he has the Civil War as a mid-cycle conflict, that is one that did not solve the problem of elite overproduction and start a new secular cycle. But here is makes the case that elite overproduction was very much the case in the run up to the Civil War. As I see it the Civil War destroyed one category of elites, Southern slaveowners, every bit as effectively as William the Conqueror eliminated Saxon elites. That is the Civil War solved the problem of elite proliferation for the times. Industrial elites (e.g. Robber Barons) were not (yet) a major factor in 1860, a majority of the workforce were still farmers.
The figure above shows the value of a slave in terms of economic impact (that is, what would impact politics). A major plantation owner with 500 slaves would hold wealth of about $150 million in 1837, and when you add land it would be about $250 million. In comparison the single largest fortune at the time (a Northerner I believe) I estimate at $6 billion in 2011. There were 13 slaveowners with 500 or more slaves in 1860. I suspect the situation was similar to today. The richest northerners were those like Bill Gates or the tech billionaires who got rich in the hot new industry of the time and did not exercise political power in proportion to their wealth. Thus, although a dozen "quarter billionaires" did not collectively posses the money of the richest northerners, the latter were probably more disengaged for politics, whereas the Southern elites, like the Koch brothers, were plugged in. As a result the South was dominant politically for longer than their relative wealth would suggest (look at how many early presidents hailed from the South). By 1860 they were seriously outnumbered both in terms of elite numbers and elite wealth (clout), however and politics went the culturally Northern way.
The Civil War saw the complete destruction of the Southern elite as a class. When you take the impact of slavery into account, as I have done below but which many scholars have not, you can see a distinct reduction in inequality (although short-lived) after the Civil War.
If I am correct, this means that Turchins's secular cycle corresponds to the S&H generational cycle, which was not the case for the agrarian era. In this case, having an understanding of the saeculum can provide insights that Turchin does not have.