Why did the United States experience a market revolution after 1815?

> CHRONOLOGY

1807
  • Robert Fulton sets off steamboat craze.

1816
  • Second Bank of the United States chartered.

1819
  • Financial panic disrupts economy.

1825
  • Erie Canal completed in New York.

1829
  • Baltimore and Ohio Railroad construction begins.

1834
  • Female mill workers strike in Lowell, Massachusetts, and again in 1836.

The return of peace in 1815 unleashed powerful forces that revolutionized the organization of the economy. Spectacular changes in transportation facilitated the movement of commodities, information, and people, while textile mills and other factories created many new jobs, especially for young unmarried women. Innovations in banking, legal practices, and tariff policies promoted swift economic growth.

This was not yet an industrial revolution, as was beginning in Britain, but rather a market revolution fueled by traditional sources—water, wood, beasts of burden, and human muscle. What was new was the accelerated pace of economic activity and the scale of the distribution of goods. The nature and scale of production and consumption changed Americans’ economic behaviors, attitudes, and expectations. The new economy also carried great risk, which periodically resulted in economic crashes.