The Industrial Revolution displaced an economically balanced American society with one associated with Wealth Disparity.

 

Obviously, there have always been wealthy rulers. Old wealth, however, was based upon taxation of subjects. People pursued their own economic agendas while paying a mandatory tax. In this older artisan economy, each producer was able to keep the full measure of profit from his efforts. Artisanship meant everyone had an opportunity to produce individual wealth within a democratic society. The Industrial Revolution changed that.

 

The Industrial Revolution saw people move from craftsmen to assembly line workers. Craftsmanship was no longer past from generation to generation, from father to son asd it was in the artisan economy. Craft knowledge during the Industrial Revolution was being consolidated amongst company managers; piece workers were just taught a small disassociated portion of the entire craft. Knowledge of what portion of the profits of production was produced by each worker was also consolidated and kept secret as so called proprietary information. Thus the worker lost sight of what value their efforts actually were worth. Workers were compelled to rely upon the company to define worker worth. The company owner was then in a position to skim profits of production away from the actual producers and pocketed the profits for himself. Consequently, these company owners became known as Robber Barons.