The fact that the Industrial Revolution, which originated in England, changed the world is undisputed. Our present lifestyle would have been vastly different had the related events not have occurred. However, we must not romanticize the early changes. They were plagued with disease, poverty, exploitation of children, and the deterioration of the working class. Badly needed reforms came slowly, but inventions and improvements grew at a rapid pace, all of which evolved into the Post-Industrial society of today.

The Industrial Revolution can be defined as the application of power-driven machinery to manufacturing. It had its beginning in remote times, and is still continuing in some places. In the eighteenth century all of Western Europe began to industrialize rapidly, but in England the process was most highly accelerated. England’s head start may be attributed to the emergence of a number of simultaneous factors.

Britain had burned up her oak forests in its fireplaces, but large deposits of coal were still available for industrial fuel. There was an abundant labor supply to mine coal and iron, and to man the factories. From the old commercial empire there remained a fleet,

and England still possessed colonies to furnish raw materials and act as captive markets for manufactured goods. Tobacco merchants of Glasgow and tea merchants of London and Bristol had capital to invest and the technical know-how derived from the Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century. Last, but no least important, the isolation of England saved industrial development from being interrupted by war. Soon all Western Europe was more or less industrialized, and the coming of electricity and cheap steel after 1850 further speeded the process.

The Industrial Revolution brought with it an increase in population and urbanization, as well as new social classes. “Cities and towns grew dramatically in the first half of the nineteenth century. They were rapidly becoming places for manufacturing and industry; the dramatic growth of such cities produced miserable living conditions for many of the inhabitants.” (Western Civilization, 416). “There were 63 families where there were at least five persons to one bed; and there were some in which even six were packed in one bed, lying at the top and bottom—children and adults. Sanitary conditions in these towns were appalling. City streets were often used as sewers and open drains.” (Western Civilization, 417).

Just as the Industrial Revolution took workers from home to factory, so our current technological revolution has allowed several million workers to return home. There they do their work, while they commute electronically with their company. Compared with early industrialization, workers today have far more leisure. “A hundred years ago the work week was half again as long as today’s, for the then workers had to be at their machines 60 hours a week. When workers unionized, they demanded a

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