Why Was There an Industrial Revolution?

478 Words2 Pages
The industrial revolution took place due to an agricultural revolution that occurred because of an increasing population. The introduction of enclosed farming meant that the poorer people lost out and travelled to towns to seek work. The domestic system meant that many people worked from home, spinning and weaving cotton brought in from North America. They were paid a fraction of the cost that it was eventually sold for. Entrepreneurs started to create new inventions that would speed up the process of spinning and weaving meaning more cotton could be produced and exported. Mills started to be built as entrepreneurs started to hire workers to work there. The new technology that was produced such as the Spinning Jenny or Water Frame allowed each worker to produce more at a lower cost. The new technology was only enabled by water power and later steam power, allowing the industrial revolution in Britain to evolve quickly. The building of canals, Turnpike roads and railways allowed raw material within Britain to be transported to where they needed to be quickly. The British Empire has plenty of trading ships allowing cheap raw materials (cotton) to be brought back to Britain through Liverpool. Trading ships also carried finished goods from the mills out of the countries and canal boats, horse and carriages and trains later on transported finished products throughout Britain. Building a mill, equipping it with machines, and buying the materials to get it up and running was expensive; meaning the products made had to be sold for a profit. Often meaning that the materials needed were bought in overseas colonies for unfair prices and sold on to make a large profit some of which went back into buying new equipment to allow more cotton made faster and at a lower cost, increasing the profit even further. Over half the cotton goods made were exported. This ability to sell
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