Industrialism

     Industrialism was when the United States began to grow in its industry changing and improving  the economy rapildy. The U.S. began discovering new resources, larger workforces, new inventions, new land mass, new transportation editions, big buisnesses and the production of factories. Industrialism bettered the economy in many different ways, creating new jobs, raising the wealth of America, and bringing a dramtic rise in the standard of living for all Americans (Telephone, light bulb, refrigerator, etc.).
     Although the rise of industrialism betttered the over all economy and increased the amount of jobs in America, it did not however better the working conditions or benefits of a typical industrial worker. Life for any worker in Industrailized America was hard. Machines replaced skilled labor and work became monotonous. workers had to preform highly specific, repetitive tasks and took little to no pride in their work. Workign conditions were highly dangerous and unhealthy. Working with heavy machines lacking saftey devices caused very high percentages of injuries and workers breathed in dust, lint, and toxic fumes.
                                                                 3 outside sources-
     Henry George, a journalist in San Francisco, was puzzled by the existence of extreme wealth and extreme poverty side by side. He said at the beginning of the era it was expected that labor-saving inventions would reduce/lighten the toil and improve the conditions of laborers. It was thought that the enormous increase in the power of producing wealth would make the real poverty a thing of the past. However, he says from all parts of the civilized world come complaints of industrial depression; labor condemned to involuntary idleness. All the dull, deadening pain, all the keen, maddening anguish, that to great masses of men are involved in the "hard times," afflict the world to-day.
     David A. Wells, a scientist and economist, was one of the first Americans to notice how machines were taking peoples jobs. He says the individual no longer works as independently as formerly, but as a private in the ranks, obeying orders, keeping step, as it were, to the tap of the drum, and having nothing to say as to the plan of his work, of its final completion, or of ots ultimate use and distribution. He's saying that the people who work in the modern (modern at the time) factory are taught to do one thing and when there is no more of that kind of work to be done, they are helpless. It resulted that the individualism or independence of the producer in manufacturing was destroyed as well as their pride which workmen formely took in their work.
     Andrew Carnegie is the last outside source. The Scottish-born "King of Steel," was the biggest industrialist in the late 1800's. He says that before industrialization that America was a "community of toilers with an undeveloped continent before them, and destitute of the refinements and elegancies of life." He says "Contrasted with that of today, we might almsot conclude that we were upon another planet and subject to different primary conditions." The development of industry had led to an expansion of trade. "Altogether life has beccome vastly better worth living than it was a century ago."
   
     I think that industrialism has improved the way America is and was. If not for industrialism, the way America runs woulf not be the same. And we would not be a dominant country. If industrialism did not occur, Americas economy would not have boosted and America would not be the same today.