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Wages and Salaries
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- By the end of the 17th century, money was widely used as a medium of exchange and a large section of the people received their income in the form of wages and salaries rather than in goods.
- As a result, people had more options for how to spend their money, and the market for goods increased.
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Growing Population and Increase in Number of Towns
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- From the eighteenth century, many towns in Europe were growing in area and population, nearly doubling between 1750 and 1800.
- The largest of them was London, which served as the hub of the country’s markets, with the next largest ones located close to it.
- By the eighteenth century, the centre of global trade had shifted from the Mediterranean ports of Italy and France to the Atlantic ports of Holland and Britain.
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Network of Transportation
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- In England, the movement of goods between markets was helped by a good network of rivers, and an indented coastline with sheltered bays.
- Until the spread of railways, transport by waterways was cheaper and faster than by land.
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Strong Financial System
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- The Bank of England served as the central focus of the country’s financial system (founded in 1694).
- In England, there were over a hundred provincial banks by 1784; over the following ten years, their numbers tripled.
- These banks provided the capital necessary to start and support large industrial enterprises.
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Rich Source of Staple Materials for Mechanisation
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- The availability of coal, iron ore, and other industrial minerals like lead, copper, and tin made England fortunate because these elements were essential for mechanization.
- By 1848, Britain was smelting more iron than the rest of the world put together.
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Technological Inventions for Cotton Spinning and Weaving
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- From the seventeenth century, the country had been importing bales of cotton cloth from India at great cost. As the East India Company’s political control of parts of India was established, it began to import, along with cloth, raw cotton, which could be spun and woven into cloth in England.
- A series of technological inventions successfully closed the gap between the speed of spinning raw cotton into yarn or thread, and of weaving the yarn into fabric.
- To make it even more efficient, production gradually shifted from the homes of spinners and weavers to factories.
- Raw cotton had to be entirely imported and a large part of the finished cloth was exported. This sustained the process of colonization so that Britain could retain control over the sources of raw cotton as well as the markets.
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Steam Power
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- The ability of steam to provide enormous amounts of power was a key factor in large-scale industrialization. In 1840, British steam engines were generating more than 70 per cent of all European horsepower.
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Emergence of Railway
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- Railways emerged as a new means of transportation that was available throughout the year, both cheap and fast, to carry passengers and goods. The invention of the railways took the entire process of industrialization to a second stage.
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