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Industrial Revolution Essay

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The Industrial Revolution

The Agriculture Revolution was a time when people worked the land by using simple hand tools. By the 1800’s, most people in Western Europe and the United States lived on farms. The nation’s economy was based on farming and the making of goods by hand and trading. They lived in rural areas in little cottages lit with firelight and candles. They made their own clothes and grew their own food. The system of making your own clothes was called the putting out system. The putting out system was the production of goods in homes under the supervision of a merchant who "put out" the raw materials, and paid for the finished product, which they then sold to a distant market. People also sold and traded their …show more content…

This was called the Cottage Industry.
The Industrial Revolution in Great Britain took place from 1750-1850 and started for multiple reasons. It replaced simple handmade tools with machinery. After this, an abundance of people left their farms and moved to cities so they could work in factories and earn more money. This was the beginning of urbanization. While working in the factories, the workers endured 14-hour workdays and at the end of the day they went home to their multistory tenements, which were small, run down apartments in the poor areas of the city. In the early days of the Industrial Revolution, factories employed women and young children and made them work long hours for cheap pay. Eventually, reforms were instituted in order to curb the abuses.
The men who provided the money to build factories and/or managed new businesses were called entrepreneurs. They organize, operate and assume the risk of a new business. They became the new members of the middle class and joined the ranks of merchants, shop owners, doctors and lawyers.
In the early 1800s, some people thought that the government should not interfere in the free operation of the economy. This thought process was called Laissez-Faire. Adam Smith, who was considered the prophet of Laissez-Faire, believed that unregulated businesses would help everyone by producing more goods at lower prices, which could be afforded by all. not just the rich. Others, however, supported

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