Expository Essay

Jasmin Aguilar
Period 6
The Industrial Revolution in Britain in the 1800’s

The Industrial Revolution was a time period of greatly increased output of machine made goods that began in Britain during the 1800’s. It began with trying new agricultural methods and the goal was to produce more food with fewer workers, which then led to many other new inventions. Britain had all factors of production needed, like the expanding economy, bank system, overseas trade, natural resources etc… so it was them who started the Industrial Revolution. It then lead to something greater which had both positive and negative technological, economic, and social effects. To begin with, the Industrial Revolution had both positive and negative technological effects. A positive invention during the Industrial Revolution would be the invention of the Bessemer process for making steel by Henry Bessemer. This invention had a positive effect on the Industrial Revolution because it made the process a whole lot easier. It also helped produce larger quantities of refined cleaner steel for a lot cheaper. It was more for less, and it also led to the new age of buildings which were now a lot safer than before, along with bigger factories, and easier ways of transportation because railroad tracks were built. A second positive technological invention would be the steam engine by James Watt, which is also known as one of the greatest inventions ever made. The steam engine was a cheap efficient power source that burned less fuel and generated more power. The steam engine could be used wherever coal existed and that resulted into more factories being built in more locations. Transportation was then made into the form of trains and steamboats, which made the whole process a lot easier. One of the negative technological effects the Industrial Revolution had was the invention of the cotton gin by Eli Whitney. Although the cotton gin made the cleaning process of cotton a whole lot easier it required more slaves to work in factories that were in horrible conditions which later resulted in many deaths and accidents. The slaves had no other choice because they had to feed their families so they were pretty much obligated and it’s pretty sad to know that they couldn’t do anything about it, they were helpless.

In addition, the Industrial Revolution also had positive and negative economic effects. A positive economic effect was the number of industrial production in Britain. The industrial production of cotton, coal, and steel made Britain number 1 in world production, which was a great achievement. A second great achievement was that Britain now had a tremendous amount of wealth which facilitated lots of things for them. A negative economic effect that came with the Industrial Revolution was the changing in class structure. You were now defined in a social status because of your wealth. I know I wouldn’t like to be classified lower or higher than others because of money, it wouldn’t feel right. This also gave wealthier people more advantages which were in no way fair to the others. There were the Industrial Capitalists, which came from a variety of backgrounds who organized and ran factories. The Urban Middle Class, which had long established professions, like doctors, lawyers etc… And last but not least there were the Urban Poor, which had little education and lived in appalling conditions, this was the largest group. The Urban Poor couldn’t move up because they needed education which is sad because this was the largest group and it meant the others didn’t care. All the others cared about was their ranking in status. A second negative economic effect that came with the Industrial Revolution was the wages the workers received. The workers were overworked and underpaid; they worked six days a week for twelve to fourteen hours a day. Men were paid ten to fifteen shillings, women were paid 5 shillings, and children were paid 1 shilling. They practically did the same

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