Term | Definition |
Industrial Revolution | A period of rapid growth in the use of machines in manufacturing and production that began in the mid-1700's |
enclosure movement | A process in Europe from 1700's to the mid-1800's where landowners fenced small fields to create large farms, allowing for more efficient farming methods and increased the food supply. |
factors of production | The basic resources for industrialization, such as land, labor, and capital |
cottage industry | A usually small-scale industry carried on at home by family members using the own equipment |
factory | A place where goods are manufactured in large quantity |
industrialization | Developing industries for the production of goods |
Jethro Tull | British inventor ; invented the seed drill |
Richard Arkwright | English inventor ; in 1769 patented the spinning frame which spun stronger tighter thread |
James Watt | Scottish inventor ; developed crucial innovations to make the steam engine efficient fast, and better able to power machinery |
Robert Fulton | American engineer and inventor ; built the first successful steamboat |
labor union | An organization representing workers' interests |
strike | A work stoppage |
mass production | The system of manufacturing large numbers of identical items |
interchangeable parts | Identical machine-made parts that can be substituted for each other in manufacturing |
assembly line | A mass-production in which a predict is moved forward through many work stations where workers perform specific tasks |
laissez-faire | A business system where companies are allowed to conduct business without interference by the government |
Adam Smith | Scottish economist ; became the leading advocate of laissez faire |
Thomas Malthus | English econimists and sociologists ; his theory that population growth would exceed the growth of food production and that poverty would always exist was used to justify low wages and laws restricting charity to the poor |
entrepreneur | A risk taker who starts a new business within the economic system of capitalism |
Andrew Carnegie | American industrialist and humanitarian ; he led the expansion of the U.S steel industry in the late 1800s and early 1900s |
socialism | a political and economic system in which society, usually in the form of the government, owns the means of production |
Karl Marx | German social philosopher and chief theorist of modern socialism and communism |
communism | economic and political system in which government owns the means of production and controls economic planning |
standard of living | a measure of the quality of life |