If
I Wanted to Make America Prosperous Again
First,
I would ask myself how did our ancestors build America from an agricultural
colony on the edge of civilization into the number one manufacturing and
commercial nation the world had ever known.
Why
reinvent the wheel if round ones still roll?
The
early American colonies of the British were founded based upon the economic
ideas of Mercantilism.
Governmental regulation of industries, trade, and commerce characterized
Mercantilism as every aspect of the economy was utilized for national policy.
This was especially true with foreign trade, which was determined more by
national aims rather than individual or local interests.
The
definition of wealth began to change in the sixteenth century. During the Middle Ages, wealth was defined by the
amount of productive land a nation possessed. As transportation, especially by
sea, improved so did the ability to conduct foreign trade bringing with it an
increase in the amount of cash generated by that trade. The definition of
wealth came to be the amount of cash a nation possessed. Therefore every nation
sought to have a favorable balance of trade. They also sought to develop
monopolistic type environments wherein they provided their own raw materials
thus avoiding imports which meant money flowing out and fostering the export of
finished goods raising the level of money flowing in. Defining wealth as the
accumulation of cash, the nations of Europe desired to conduct foreign trade on
a larger scale, and they began looking for foreign sources of gold, silver, and
raw materials.
This
brings us to the British effort to develop North America as a source of
wealth.
The
Chesapeake
colonies of Virginia and Maryland were the first successful British colonies
in what was to become the United States of America. Though the initial
colonists came looking for gold they soon learned that prosperity came not from
a shovel but instead from a plow. It was tobacco that primed the pump and
lifted the colonies from a burden to a benefit for the mother country. After
years of mounting expenses for the British and years of starvation for the
colonists the cultivation of tobacco brought prosperity. Virginia’s production
of tobacco grew from 200,000 pounds in 1624 to 3,000,000 pounds in 1638
overtaking the West Indies as the number one supplier of tobacco for all of
Europe thus boosting Britain’s balance of trade.
The
cultivation of tobacco fostered a plantation system based upon indentured and
slave labor. A gentrified class of great planters sought to replicate the
social structure of Britain with a small number of very rich ruling a large
number of small land holders who prospered to a certain extent but never enough
to challenge the status quo. The wretched poor of Britain who had come to the
Chesapeake colonies to find a better life did find more opportunity and the
ability to advance from the landless poor to the ranks of yeoman farmer.
However, there was little opportunity to enter the ranks for the gentry which
became a type of American nobility.
New
England, because of the soil, the climate, and the fact that there was no major
cash crop that grew well in the area, did not lend itself to large plantations.
Most farmers were operating at a subsistence level. If they did generate a
surplus it was in crops that were not easily transported across the ocean, and
they were also crops that could be grown in England and were not needed as
imports.
This
climatic and environmental adversity did not condemn New England to being a poor
relation to the Chesapeake nobility. Instead the New English diversified,
innovated, and used individual enterprise to not only match but to surpass
Chesapeake and every other colony in the British Empire. Those who settled New
England were Puritans who sought to
purify the Anglican religion of ceremony and return it to what they saw as the
simplicity of early Christianity. They did not believe that good works brought
salvation but they did believe that salvation brought good works. Therefore
they sought to occupy their time with productive activity to glorify God through
their labors. This was a manifestation of what the sociologist Max Weber later
called ,
“The Protestant work ethic.” Whatever you choose to call it, it was this drive
to succeed no matter what the adversity that led the New English to look beyond
the soil, beyond the climate and to the opportunity.
First
they exploited the fisheries of the Northeast. In 1641 the New English caught
600,000 pounds of fish much of which was exported to Britain. By 1645 they were
catching more than 6,000,000 pounds per year employing more than a thousand men
on 440 ships. They came to dominate the fish trade shipping not only to Britain
and its empire but also to Spain, Portugal, the Azores, Madeira, and the Canary
Islands.
By
the end of the 1600s the merchants of the New English coast began to circle the
globe trading the fish, surplus crops, and lumber of their area to all parts of
the British Empire. They became such shrewd traders that soon American ships
were carrying trade from one colony to another even when the cargo didn’t
originate in New England. This secondary carrying trade generated a growing
profit that in turn rebounded in a number of ways. The increased profits
brought home financed increased industry and growth at home, and it also spawned
a shipbuilding industry which exploited the vast resources of the northern
forests.
Between
1674 and 1714 the New English built more than 1200 ships, totaling more than
75,000 tons. By 1700 there were fifteen shipyards in Boston which produced more
ships than all the rest of the British colonies combined. Only London had more
shipyards. This was a significant engine of economic growth. To build one 150
ton merchant ship required as many as 200 workers, mostly skilled craftsmen.
The shipyards also supported the growth of numerous enterprises to supply their
needs such as saw mills, smithies, barrel makers, sail makers, iron foundries,
and rope makers. In addition, the farmers of New England benefited by feeding
the craftsmen, supplying the ships, and providing the timber.
By
1700 Boston was the third city of the Empire behind only London and Bristol and
the New English shippers were earning freight charges for carrying produce and
material that was neither produced, shipped to, or shipped from their home
colony. The enrichment of the area spread prosperity far beyond the sphere of
shippers, sailors, and their sundry suppliers. According to Boston’s shipping
register for 1697-1714 over 25% of the adult males in Boston owned shares in at
least one ship.
All
of these linkages produced an economy filled with diversification and
development as opposed to the stratified monoculture of the Chesapeake
colonies.
These
trends continued as time went on leading to the industrial North eventually
overwhelming the agricultural South. The expansion and growth of America was
based upon a foundation of hard work and innovation born of adversity. Finding
themselves in a hard place Americans found a way to prosper and grow like a
young plant reaching for the sun. Freed from the rigid restraints of the home
country and then guaranteed freedom by the constitution and the limited
government it provided America surged to the front ranks of nations.
Today,
America labors under self-imposed adversity. We are in the grip of an
oppressive Progressive Movement that after 100 years of incremental advance is
poised to transform America from
what she has always been into what they want her to be. America has
traditionally been a constitutionally limited Republic operating on democratic
principles providing individual liberty and economic opportunity. The
Progressives envision America as a centrally-planned highly regimented social democracy where the wealth is spread
around from each
according to their abilities to each according to their needs .
If
I wanted to make America prosperous again I would take off the self-imposed
shackles of a central government on steroids, stop imposing new regulations, and
reduce taxes everywhere on everyone. Then I would stand back and watch our
economy takes off like a rocket and we take our place beside our ancestors as
free people with economic liberty and a will to succeed.
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