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The Agriculture Revolution was a time when people worked the land by using simple hand tools. By the 18005 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 11t 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 ut” the raw materials, and paid for the finished product, which they then sold toa distant market. People also sold and traded their self-made goods within short distances from their location. People did not know much about villages that were beyond them because they were confined within 25 miles of their birthplace. This was because traveling by dirt roads was slow. During this time period, there was a rapid growth in the population called population explosion.
Britain’s population went from 5 million in 1700 to almost 9 million in 1800, The population boom was due ore to the decline in deaths than the increase in childbirth. The Agricultural Revolution also reduced the risk of famine because there was plenty of food to go around. Also, since the women ate better, they had healthier and stronger babies. New farming technologies also developed. A new Invention by Jethro Tull called the seed drill planted seeds In a row. This made planting easier and more efficient. sing new technology and the system of crop rotation, the rich forced the poor off the village commons that now became enclosed as private property. This caused the oor to be unemployed and they ended up as proletariats in the upcoming Industrial Revolution. Before people worked in factories. they worked in their own homes. This was called the Cottage Industry. During the winter months when farmers had free time, they would work out of their cottages and produce quality textiles for a reasonable cost. This was called the cottage Industry. The Industrial Revoluuon In Great Britain took place from 1750-1850 and started tor multiple reasons.
It replaced simple handmade tools with machinery. After this, an abundance of people left their arms 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 oney 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 ‘ Of2 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. ot Just the ich. Others, however, supported socialist thinking whereby the people as a whole should own and operate businesses, farms and railroads, rather than private individuals. In the 1840s, Karl Marx took socialism toa different level. He, along with Friedrich Engels, published a booklet called The Communist Manifesto. He believed that history was a struggle between classes, which would end with the working class being the victors. His theory was called “Marxism”. Marx despised capitalism, as he believed it created prosperity for a few and poverty for most.
In later years, different countries like Russia, adapted their own Marxist ideas to their own ends. Great Britain had valuable natural resources, such as iron and coal, which were needed to make machinery and run steam engines. In addition, Britain had money to invest in railroads and factories, as well as markets and could sell the manufactured goods. Eventually, by the late 1800s, large-scale companies needed so much capital that they formed corporations wherein businesses sold stock in the company and were owned by many different investors