The South had no industries. It was agriculture.

As compared to?…… The economy of the south was enhanced by the use of slavery but probably not as much as the economy of the north was. It’s hard to say what the picture would have been like had slaves not been employed since it did not happen. The period was a brief one that was brought to an end by the industrial revolution. Even if the Civil War had not happened the end of slavery was in the handwriting on the wall. Farm machinery would soon take over and make the cost of keeping slaves too high for the work they could do. The benefit of slave labor was that it made agriculture a little cheaper but that just made farm goods cheaper for the mills of the north to make into textiles. It was the sale of the textile to Europe that brought in the big money. No doubt the large plantation owners made money, but had there not been slave labor, there likely would still have been a demand for things like cotton and it would have cost more . The increased costs would have been passed on and that might have affected the price of goods for export. So it’s a tough question to answer definitively. Some of the pressure for the Civil War came from wealthy mill owners in the north who eyed the rich farmlands and climate of the south and wanted direct control.

Since the south’s wealth was tied mainly to agriculture, it’s hard to tell how much wealth was made. Untold millions I would say !