Indrustrialization After the Civil War Final Paper

Industrialization after the Civil War
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Industrialization after the Civil War
Introduction
After the civil war, the world’s attention was drawn to America because of its industrialization process mainly catalyzed by the social, economy, and politics developments. The US economy grew rapidly because of the technological advancement. At the beginning of the century, growth came along with improved living standards, introduction of new legislation to facilitate growth and introduction of cheaper accessible products among others. These are some of the positive outcomes recorded after the American civil war. However other concerns emerged due to population expansion (Kutler, 2006). This essay highlights some of the major implications of industrialization witnessed after the Civil War between 1865 and 1920, illustrating the political, social and economic systems role in this process. The Civil War helps in understanding the implications that come along with growth and development as many people expected only positive outcomes. In this case, other negative outcomes emerged including health problems owing to poor sanitation. Industrialization is a process that generated mixed ideas about the changes in America society.
America Industrialization and Its Effects
Industrialization in America was facilitated by geographical characteristics due to economic and social factors. America utilized all the geographical aspects to realize economic growth. For example, the growth of its steel industry resulted to employment opportunities within the regions, raising the living standards of people living around the industries. As a result of industrialization, the country used it regional transport networks and improved them to facilitate movement of goods. With the introduction of rail and steam engines, accessibility to various potential regions accelerated the supply of goods. Improved transportation networks also facilitated regional movements from one area to another. For example, slaves moved from south towards the industrialized areas in North to escape racial discrimination that was widely accepted in the southern part of the country. Movement to urban cities from rural areas caused overcrowding resulting to health problems generated from unhealthy working and living conditions (Sreenivasan, 2009).
Businesses recorded high profits and benefited from the economic expansion as the country became the economic hub of the region. However, these achievements came along with some of negative elements. Owing to the readily available labor, skilled workers were disadvantaged because industries preferred to maximize profits using cheap unskilled labor rather than hiring skilled workers. Industrialization also encouraged child labor. Children were mistreated and worked in unsafe environment. For lower class Americans, life expectancy greatly reduced because of the unhealthy living conditions generated from increased rural-urban migration in search of better life (Sreenivasan, 2009).
The government was forced to make changes in its legislation to adjust to the problems generated from industrialization. One of the government legislations required that businesses could form...