Shopping Center History
Tom Hanchett, “U.S. Tax Policy and the Shopping-Center Boom of the 1950s and 1960s,” American Historical Review (October 1996), traced the explosion of suburban shopping centers in the mid-20th century U.S. to a federal tax break called “accelerated depreciation.”
The article may be downloaded for a fee or read for free online.
Reactions to the research:
- “Groundbreaking” — Malcolm Gladwell
- Smithsonian Magazine: “The Death and Rebirth of the American Mall”
- The blog Ped Shed: “Accelerated Depreciation = Accelerated Suburbia”
- European journal Positionen: “Talking Shopping Center”
Planning and Subsidizing Suburbia
The Other Subsidized Housing: Federal Aid To Suburbanization