Whenever I look at some OTL version of America, be it French, Spanish, under the Union Jack, Japanese, Swiss, or anything else it is always an industrial power. What would an smaller scale industry society be like? Look to the South as an example with wealthy landowners, middle class farmers, and poor tenants? Or something else?
Must America always be industrial?
- Thread starter Fenwick
- Start date
No. For major modern industrial development to happen, a country needs: 1. A reasonably stable but not too intrusive government, with a workable monetary policy.
2. A decent, fairly stable banking system that is conducive to practical lending (to put together capital for ventures).
3. A business culture that encourages innovation and entrepaneurship.
4. Some version of a patent system may not be required but is useful.
People tend to get hung up on battles, religion or physical resources, forgetting the importance of institutions. Give the US bad luck in these areas, and its development might be stunted, a la much of Latin America. Note that in 1789 most of this was already in place.
2. A decent, fairly stable banking system that is conducive to practical lending (to put together capital for ventures).
3. A business culture that encourages innovation and entrepaneurship.
4. Some version of a patent system may not be required but is useful.
People tend to get hung up on battles, religion or physical resources, forgetting the importance of institutions. Give the US bad luck in these areas, and its development might be stunted, a la much of Latin America. Note that in 1789 most of this was already in place.
Pennsylvania was essentially a Saudi Arabia of Oil which unless you get rid of the internal combustion engine certainly encourages industrialization. Of course the coal as MNP shows helps immensely too. Also America also has numerous navigable rivers which open up vast amounts of land to trade and settlement.
Besides these geographic factors we could have been a lot worse off. But some level of industrialization seems inevitable.
Besides these geographic factors we could have been a lot worse off. But some level of industrialization seems inevitable.
Another interesting fact, the world's 3 super powers, Russia, China, and the United States, are also the three largest producers of Steel. The United States also has the third largest population on earth after India and China. Add these together with the fact that the United States got the lion's share of the North American Bread-basket lands, and boom. It's all statistics really.Well the country has an enormous amount of coal. Wiki gives a number of 22.51% of global recoverable reserves as of 2006 in the US. Looking at the raw numbers, no other country even comes close.
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archaeogeek
Banned
And yet South Africa largely outproduces large parts of Europe, with Spain above France and Britain.
No, to be honest, a different political culture could have wrecked it: have a more entrenched plantocracy and while it will almost inevitably industrialize (Latin America did, too, after all) it should delay it a lot. Basically the entire country would have to be like the antebellum south.
No, to be honest, a different political culture could have wrecked it: have a more entrenched plantocracy and while it will almost inevitably industrialize (Latin America did, too, after all) it should delay it a lot. Basically the entire country would have to be like the antebellum south.
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Why should a map of 2006 coal reserves prove any indication of levels of industrialization in the past?
Coal was extremely important for the first industrial revolution. British coal miners needed a better way of pumping water out of the deeper mines that they dug and hence the steam pump was put to use. Belgium, Northern France, and England were part of the early industrial revolution and this is judged by their coal output.
However I don't just count it up to Coal or Oil, I agree with Mr Qwerty that institutions are important. England, Northern France, and Belgium also had a sophisticated merchant class and easily exploited underclass.
Coal was extremely important for the first industrial revolution. British coal miners needed a better way of pumping water out of the deeper mines that they dug and hence the steam pump was put to use. Belgium, Northern France, and England were part of the early industrial revolution and this is judged by their coal output.
However I don't just count it up to Coal or Oil, I agree with Mr Qwerty that institutions are important. England, Northern France, and Belgium also had a sophisticated merchant class and easily exploited underclass.
Good points all, but the US is never going to remain a primarily agricultural place (as others pointed out, even difficult political situations like Latin America industrialized) unless perhaps the entire world eschews industrial revolution. That I put down to resources. It might not be the number one producer, and it might end up with huge slums and a dirt poor large farm population but there's going to be industry. In a world where there are other industrial powers, I think the US is going to industrialize significantly at some point unless some other country seizes the major coal areas.