Before the Industrial Revolution, the elite was a land-based…

Question Answered step-by-step Before the Industrial Revolution, the elite was a land-based… Before the Industrial Revolution, the elite was a land-based aristocracy. Land was the source of wealth and it transfers to the oldest male children. With the expansion of the machines, things changed.  A machine could multiply an investment much quicker than land. A business-based elite was on the rise.This new business-based elite was able to surpass the power of land-based aristocracy as a result of two crucial factors. First, machines were extremely profitable. By lowering the price of labor and increasing production rates, machines offer a great profit potential.  Second, concentration of profits on very few hands.Investing on machines, as with any new technology, was very expensive. However, if successful, the investment paid off quickly and dramatically. Success in the new industrial model means expansion. To finance such expansion, companies sought capital from banks and investors. Banks and investors were happy to supply capital to expanding businesses. As their interests allied, successful business owners with financial groups become one class: the modern elite.That new elite quickly dominate the market.  Successful businesses and investors quickly to absorb businesses with less capital. The latter become subsidiaries. As the successful company expands and absorbs other businesses, only one company controls of the whole market. The dominant company was called “Trust” and the concentration process was called  “Industrial Combinations.” Think about Google and how it expanded from a search engine/advertisement to: email services (gmail), video sharing (youtube), data storage (googledrive) and geopositioning  (googlemaps). Recently, google reorganized its services around a new parent company called: Alphabet. This company controls the internet flow of data and monitors almost every western internet user. Its transformation is an example of “Industrial Combination.”In the 1890s, “Industrial Combinations” gave rise to companies such as: Standard Oil Trust (John D. Rockefeller) or United States Steel (J.P. Morgan). While the first one controlled the oil business, the second one controlled the steel business.  Andrew Carnegie sold Carnegie Steel to J.P. Morgan, which gave birth to United States Steel.  Before the Industrial Revolution, Rockefeller and Morgan were rich. As a result of the Industrial Revolution, they become Kings.  Source: John D. Rockefeller, “King of the World,” Puck Magazine, 1901. Explore PA History. Available at https://explorepahistory.com/displayimage.php?imgId=1-2-1936 (Links to an external site.) Source: Keppler, Udo J., Artist. Commercial might versus divine right / Keppler. , 1902. N.Y.: J. Ottmann Lith. Co., Puck Bldg. Photograph. Library of Congress. Available at https://www.loc.gov/item/2010652000/.  Old Kings justified their power on God and Birth. The New Kings justified their power on wealth.  For them,  kingship was not inherit, but acquired through investment, innovation and individual work. This principle gave birth to our modern understanding of wealth and its relationship to human qualities.     Document analysis- Excerpts from Testimony before the Industrial Commission on Standard Oil Business by John D. RockefellerStandard Oil Trust was the iconic industrial combinations and it exemplified how the Industrial Revolution led to the concentration of wealth Source: Rockefeller, John D. “Testimony before the Industrial Commission on Standard Oil Business Practices.” Primary Source Documents: 1900 to 1909, Facts On File, 2014.History Research Center, online.infobase.com/Auth/Index?aid=17443&itemid=WEHRC&articleId=470168. MCC Library Access Point:  https://ezproxy.middlesexcc.edu/login?url=https://online.infobase.com/Auth/Index?aid=17443&itemid=WEHRC&primarySourceId=12440″The cause leading to its formation [Industrial Combination or Trusts] was the desire to unite our skill and capital in order to carry on a business of some magnitude and importance in place of the small business that each separately had heretofore carried on. As time elapsed and the possibilities of the business became apparent, we found further capital to be necessary, obtained the required persons and capital and organized the Standard Oil Company, with a capital of $1,000,000. Later we found more capital could be utilized and found persons with capital to interest themselves with us, and increased our capital to $3,500,000. As the business grew, and markets were obtained at home and abroad, more persons and capital were added to the business, and new corporate agencies were obtained or organized, the object being always the same, to extend our business by furnishing the best and cheapest products” “It is too late to argue about advantages of industrial combinations. They are a necessity. And if Americans are to have the privilege of extending their business in all the States of the Union, and into foreign countries as well, they are a necessity on a large scale, and require the agency of more than one corporation.” Questions:  Questions Thread Two(*) Upload answers on Assignment Tab(**) Provide specific information from Thread’s content. Explain the relationship between the rise of Industrial Combinations and the rise of the new Elite (at least two paragraphs)  History US History HY 1010 Share QuestionEmailCopy link Comments (0)