reflection #3

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Early Industrialization part 1

First Country in History Americans industrialized their economy in the 1800s by learning and applying the self- sustaining growth of capitalism. Great Britain, though, was the first country to industrialize beginning in the late 1700s. This means the British were the first to create the self-sustaining growth of capitalism. No other country in history had previously understood and applied technology to increase productivity to create wealth the way Great Britain began to do in the late 1700s. More wealth meant a higher standard of living – economic progress. Textiles – the weaving of fabric, often to make clothes – was the first business to industrialize. This business was often called “cotton manufacture” because it manufactured cotton textiles. The key technology in early industrialization was James Watt’s Steam Engine (1769).

Energy & Energy Transitions Let’s pause here to make sure we understand the importance of the steam engine. Energy is key to economic development. Creating efficient energy enables a society to produce valuable goods and services. Remember, a society has to produce value before it can consume value. Societies which create and use efficient energy experience progress. They go from underdeveloped to developing, or developing to developed. The steam engine was a more efficient way of producing energy. It represented an energy transition from wood to coal – it burned coal to create energy. An energy transition means a society goes from depending on one kind of energy to increasingly using another, more efficient energy. The following points help us understand what an energy transition is:

• Energy transitions are long, usually occurring over significant time. The steam engine was developed over the course of about a century. Early versions appeared around 1700 and inventors continued to improve the technology over time. James Watt continued to improve his 1769 version, which is why you might see different dates for his steam engine.

• An energy transition does not mean that the older form of energy stops being used completely, especially not in just a generation or two. Rather, a transition means as technology helps create a more efficient way of producing energy, the new form of energy is gradually used more and the older form of energy is gradually used less. The older form, though, continues to be used for a long time, as both newer and older forms of energy coexist to provide society’s energy needs.

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• Energy transitions are complex. They involve how tens or hundreds of millions of people throughout society produce and use energy. Transitions thus occur gradually. Some in society begin to try newer forms of energy while still using older forms. If the newer forms work – provide more efficient energy at lower costs – then more will begin trying the newer form of energy over time.

• Energy transitions are a bottom-up process. This means that successful transitions are usually not simply the result of new laws passed by government (top-down). Rather, successful transitions are usually the result of millions of people experimenting with what kinds of energy provide efficiency and at what cost (bottom-up). Finding this better efficiency at lower cost is a process of discovery. It cannot simply be commanded.

• Keep the above points in mind when we discuss other energy transitions in later lectures, such as the transition from coal to oil in the late 1800s and early 1900s. This transition was important, but even to this day the older form of energy – coal – continues to be used to produce electricity; just less coal is used because of energy transitions.

• Today the United States is undergoing an energy transition from oil to natural gas. The increasing use of natural gas is a major reason our CO₂ emissions have decreased since the turn of the 21st century.

So the energy transition from wood to coal began around 1700 and increased with James Watt’s Steam Engine in 1769. The steam engine powered textile machines like Edmund Cartwright’s Power Loom (1785) to massively increase productivity in textile manufacturing. Yet the steam engine not only increased productivity in manufacturing – producing more in less time – but also increased productivity in transportation – faster transportation. Steam-powered ships (steamboats) and steam-powered locomotives (railroads) emerged in the 1800s.

Second Country in History The United States was the second country to industrialize beginning in the early 1800s. It was the second country to apply technology to increase productivity to create wealth – the self- sustaining growth of capitalism. As in Great Britain, the technology of the steam engine was key. Americans used the steam engine to increase productivity in textile manufacturing and in transportation, both of which led to a boom in the iron and coal industries.

• Let’s repeat that. Try to visualize how new technology creates a web of economic development.

• As the new technology of the steam engine increased productivity in manufacturing and transportation, it increased economic development in other industries such as iron and coal. This idea of new technology creating a web of economic development is repeated in later industrialization and in post-industrial society, which we’ll discuss in later lectures.

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• Below are examples of this web of economic development in early industrialization, from text manufacturing and transportation, to the iron and coal industries.

Textile Manufacturing:

• In 1813, Boston merchants established the Boston Manufacturing Company. They built a factory in Waltham, Massachusetts which used the technology of steam-powered machinery to increase productivity in textile manufacturing.

• Within fifteen years, hundreds of textile mills spread throughout the Northeast.

• Emerging with the textile industry was the machine-tool industry. Machine-tool workers built the textile factories and “serviced” them by fixing the machinery when it broke down.

Transportation:

• Increased productivity in transportation – faster transportation – began when the inventor Robert Fulton introduced the commercial steamboat to navigate up the Hudson River in 1807. The use of the steamboat quickly spread to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to ship goods across large parts of the United States. See maps of these rivers here and here.

o The rivers were natural waterways. Americans also built canals for steamboat shipping. The Erie Canal was finished in 1825, and connected Albany to Buffalo. See the Erie Canal here.

o Since Albany was connected to New York City via the Hudson River, and Buffalo was tied to the Great Lakes and the Old Northwest, the Erie Canal linked the east and the emerging mid-west. See those links here. By 1840, Americans had built more than 3,000 miles of canals.

• Increased productivity in transportation continued with the building of railroads for steam- powered locomotives.

o By the 1830s, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) stretched seventy-three miles west of Baltimore and the Charleston Railroad went over one hundred miles west of Charleston, S.C.

o By the 1840s, Boston had three railroads connecting it to western Massachusetts and the nation had more than 3,000 miles of railroad tracks.

o By the 1850s, the nation had more than 30,000 miles of track, connecting Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, New York City to Chicago. See maps here and here.

Iron & Coal Industries – The Web of Economic Development

• The steam engine and the railroads were made of iron. So the iron industry – mining and refining iron – expanded dramatically to provide enough iron to make the engines and the railroad tracks.

• The coal industry also expanded dramatically since it was the natural resource the steam engine burned to create energy.

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This web of economic development all stemmed from the new technology of an energy transition – the Steam Engine (wood to coal). The steam engine increased productivity in manufacturing and transportation, and led to a boom in the iron and coal industries. Great Britain and the United States led the way in this economic development of early industrialization. These two countries went from underdeveloped to developing economies. But as we’ll see in the next lecture, this process of economic development was not just one dimensional. It included what economists call “creative destruction.”