My article with Paul Sharp and Maja Pedersen is now available online at Social Science History. The link to the ungated version is here. The article makes a very potent (I believe) in that it uses the trade policy preferences that Canada enjoyed with Britain from 1760 to 1870 to triangulate how the level of market integration in the North Atlantic (i.e., UK, US, Canada) was determined by policy or by natural barriers. Our conclusion is that policy mattered most. Market integration was largely hindered by trade barriers, not by natural barriers. I believe this is probably one of my consequential paper because it suggests multiple things.
First, if the United States had remained in the British Empire, there would have been a highly integrated market by the late 18th century. The first age of globalization would have occurred a century earlier.
Second, we have overstated the role of natural barriers. Agents were able to arbitrage price differences easily. It thus amplifies (although we do not discuss it much) the importance of trade policy reforms such as the 1831 Canada Trade Act, the abolition of the Corn Laws and the tariffs of abominations in the United States.
Vincent Geloso 