American Business Merit Badge Challenge #1

5-11-18 

1.A Explain the four features of the free enterprise system in the United States.  Tell its benefits and responsibilities.  Describe the difference between freedom and license.  

A quick google search yielded these results

Features

• Workers choose where to work, Employers choose who to hire and fire.
• Voluntary exchange, buyers and sellers choose do to so of their own accord.
• Private Property rights, People have the right to own and control their property and abilities
• Profit Motive, the driving force of capitalism is to end up in a better situation after a transaction than before.

Benefits

• Benefits of the free enterprise system are that people can choose to exchange personal property at will per individual agreement, people can make profit which incentivizes innovation and efficiency of use of resources.

Responsibilities

• Individuals are responsible as consumers to choose what to buy
• Businesses are responsible for producing goods and providing services for the consumers
• All interested parties are responsible for gathering as much information as possible for making educated choices in transactions.
• All interested parties are responsible for providing honest information about the services, goods and tender involved in a given transaction.

Difference between Freedom and License

• Freedom is the right for one to choose, whereas License is a requirement to receive permission to do an activity

My takeaway from 1.A – This was a general information exercise, while its common knowledge stuff, a lot of times I find it useful to review basics.  This can often times reset how I think about things and help me see what my own biases are.

1.B – Describe the Industrial Revolution:  Tell about the major developments that marked the start of the modern industrial era in the United States.  Tell about five people that had a great influence on business or industry in the United States, Tell what each did

To tackle this, the first site I visited was USHistory.org As I recognized I have forgotten a lot of the dates, names and innovations that took place during the US Industrial Revolution.  Of course I remember a lot of the concepts like assembly lines, machine production and things like that, but I was actually looking forward to revisiting the information and really getting to know what things had made such a huge impact.

Five major developments

• From handmade to machines for production
• Manufacture of machine tools
• increased use of steam power
• Rise of the factory production model
• Cotton Gin

Five people that had a great influence on business or industry in the US and tell what they did.

• Eli Whitney patented his cotton gin, this was effective in separating seeds from fibers in cotton and greatly reduced the amount of labor required in the process.
• Oliver Evans invented an automated Flour mill.  It completely eliminated the need for labor aside from loading the grain and removing the end product.
• Thomas Blanchard invented the Blanchard lathe, which could shape gun stocks repeatedly and consistently.
• James Madison established the first federal bank to alleviate the stresses of economic downturns.
• Matthias W. Baldwin made locomotives that worked on coal instead of wood.