ShmoopTube

00:03

It might be difficult to imagine that there was a time when our [Girl thinking]

00:07

economy was actually killing it no talk of recession no fiscal cliff no PhDs

00:13

flipping burgers for a living during the Gilded Age though the economy was

00:18

walking on sunshine in 1860 the nation's total wealth was

00:22

sixteen billion dollars by 1900 it was 88 billion or a per capita increase from

00:28

$500 to $1,100 so it's a lot more why so much growth was our economy just eating [Economy man appears]

00:35

all its peas and carrots or was it sneaking some growth hormone and who its [Smoothie appears]

00:39

smoothies or with an eating peas and carrots smoothies plus growth hormone none

00:44

of the above we didn't do that it actually had more to do with an

00:46

explosion in American manufacturing that happened during the Second Industrial [Explosion occurs and factory appears]

00:50

Revolution American industrial development had suddenly blasted off

00:55

industries were investing in new machines and production techniques so we [Rocket launching]

00:59

could make stuff cheaper better faster and we took our profits and invested

01:03

them in other industry to make those industries more profitable and more [Man sat at desk with pile of cash]

01:07

massive and then we took those profits and invested it we made money and only

01:12

grew and these guys are making money hand over fist this rise of Industry

01:17

dramatically changed what it meant to be an American for most people the past had [Boy sitting in a wheelbarrow]

01:21

all been about subsistence agriculture aka working on the family farm just to

01:25

basically stay alive but now America was headed towards a future filled with

01:29

smoke machines and wonderful terrifying technological discoveries a few people [Rollercoaster in motion]

01:34

rose to the top of this new American order Andrew Carnegie john d rockefeller

01:39

JP Morgan Cornelius Vanderbilt yeah those guys whose names are still all

01:45

over everything these were the original American rich deuced they were the

01:49

almost unimaginably powerful tycoons of coal oil steel and high-tech they were

01:54

called the captains of industry if that name sounds like a superhero team to [Captains of industry appear]

01:59

rival the Avengers it's because some people thought of them in exactly that [Avengers characters appear]

02:02

way well some saw the captains of mythic heroes leading America out of the

02:06

darkness of tradition and into the light of industrial production of course other

02:11

saw these guys as a little supervillain they were like the

02:14

epitome of Ebenezer Scrooge Oh which got programmed into Ultron and took over the [Ultron appears in space]

02:19

country why did something to happens of industry we're so bad well probably

02:24

because they used ruthless cutthroat tactics like exploiting poor workers and [People working in a clothing factory]

02:28

well the poor in general they were creative they found ways to make money

02:32

and yes in the process some of the workers didn't get rich along with them

02:36

it wasn't like they had stock options like today's Silicon Valley so some

02:39

people thought the rich guys were creating jobs and leading the country [Workers sitting on steel gurder eating lunch]

02:42

forward now's good thing while some people thought they were taking

02:44

advantage of the 99% you know the workers to pile up a bunch of money for

02:49

themselves that they didn't need and then gave away to create building vermin

02:53

to Rockefeller Center it's pretty cool well something a lot like the major [Men hitting each other with bags]

02:56

debates in America is still having to this day maybe one day we'll find

03:00

something new to talk about if we don't come up with something more interesting [Boy playing videogames]

03:02

to say while our friends might stop coming over to hang

Full Transcript