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21.17
Work history.1800 - 1890 CE
 
     
  While the global slave trade was enormously profitable for the first corporations and the Vatican, it remained inefficient.
 
  The gradual drip feeding of knowledge had created another problem- the growing of a conscience amongst the new educated elite.
 
  A few good men  
  Unlike the later quarter of the 20th Century and our own age where most people can be bought at a price, there emerged by the middle of the 18th century a movement of people who used their talent to write and think about how to overcome the tentacles of the catholic Church and its evil emissaries.
 
  These men found a home in America, an English colony still largely influenced by the highly profitable Catholic controlled international slave trade. While by-passing this issue to begin with, they found in the concepts of democracy and socialism two philosophies with which they could mobilize people to rise up and fight for freedom.
 
  What allowed these good men to think of noble pursuits was the combination of the re-emergence of machines, of motors and a simplied version of the domestic slave- the working class.
 
  The industrial revolution  
  Many historians especially like to speak of the industrial age as a truly watershed moment in history when man finally raised himself above his ancient ancestors and set a benchmark of greatness even higher.
 
  It was the period of the invention of engines and machines and the building of massive mills and assembly line work.
 
  In fact machines including steam engines as were a standard feature of the landscape of ancient Roman industry. The Romans were using energy sources to power large machines over 2000 years before the industrial revolution.
 
  But what made the industrial revolution different to Roman times was that it involved the enslavement of huge numbers of the former serf (slave) class into being assembly workers.
 
  This provided the grunt that made the industrial revolution what it was. The millions of children that still worked 80 hour weeks. The millions of women who slaved in cramped mills and pottery factories and other industrial monstrosities.
 
  The Romans and Greeks who invented machines had never conceived of such forced enslavement.
 
  Yet the other difference was that instead of just forcing people to work under such barbarity, they were given a basic wage, a token payment from the fortunes made so that they could purchase the necessities of life.
 
 
Industry Profile 1890
Industry %
Agriculture/Hunting 45.0%
Manufacturing/Wholesale 20.0%
Mining/Construction 13.0%
Retail Trade 9.0%
Transport/Storage 4.0%
Services 7.0%
Govt/Military 2.0%
100%
 
  Wages were not designed out of any noble gesture, but to force these poor working class to largely fend for themselves.
 
  While serfs were virtual slaves to the nobles, it was still up to the nobles to manage the affairs of the village, the housing of the village, its water sources and so on.
 
  But with basic wages, the wealthy industrialists could abdicate all responsibility to the poor to fend for themselves.
 
  The end of the slave trade
 
  The same good men who wrote about enlightenment and spoke so beautifully about emancipation really just took advantage of a trend that was already happening. If not for the industrial revolution, these great writers and speeches would have been absurd.
 
  The industrial revolution of enslaving through capitalism the domestic populations of former farm workers was a far more efficient and profitable machine than the international slave trade. It meant that large but inefficient slave driven industries could not compete with domestic markets of domestic capitalist working class slaves.
 
  As a result, demand for slaves dried up and these former slave colonies slowly found even the most basic of rights emerging for those who had survived. By 1830 slavery was banned in England and the Church of England and the Royal family was paid huge amounts by the Parliament in compensation for the losses of their slave business.
 
  In North America, the slave industry largely ceased after the Civil War at the end of the century and by 1880 the last major slave colony of South America, Brazil had ceased to allow the Catholic Church to continue slavery.
 
     
 
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