The men who built America

[Armistead]

Anyone else watching this on the History Channel? With all the crappy pawn shop and swamp people shows they finally put something on worth watching.

Capitalism in pure form...

[AVGWarhawk]

I watched a bit last night. These are very good.

[Oberon]

Sounds interesting, I imagine the railroads play a big part, like they did with our industrial revolution and our big capitalist players like George Hudson, and Cecil Rhodes.
Lots of big names in the American history, Rockefeller, Morgan, Gould, Vanderbilt. Although, one has to say, like in our nation, the real industry was built on the back of the navvies, in our case Irish labourers, in yours mostly Chinese coolies. The conditions they worked in were horrendous, their fatalities incredible, but their achievements, outstanding and forever. :yep:


Oh, and because I'm an old school gamer at heart:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/28/Sid_Meier%27s_Railroad_Tycoon.jpg/256px-Sid_Meier%27s_Railroad_Tycoon.jpg

[Stealhead]

You forgot Henry Ford and we had lots of Irish as well is was not all Chinese workers though they did play an important part.I heard this Romanian waitress once say that America was built on the backs of immigrants but they don't get much credit I agree.

[Armistead]

Chinese had little to do with the development in the east, but did lay a lot of rail out west.

Very few women came from China, except some numbers of slave prostitutes later. In fact over 70% of Chinese women were prostitutes who seldomed lived 30 days after arrival,, they were starved, doped, sexually abused. Numerous women comitted suicide given any chance.

Late 1800's congress passed several Acts that stopped Chinese immigration for many years. Those that were here didn't have Chinese women to marry, so the population never grew. It was illegal to marry whites.

It was mostly Irish immigrants that built our cities.

The rich have always found or created a large cheap labor pool, blacks, Irish, Chinese, today it's illegal Mexicans..

[Stealhead]

Your talking about the Chinese Exclusion Act.Of course Irish and others where purposefully kept down for some time and could only get crap jobs the good ones would say "no Irish (other ethnic group) need apply"

There is always someone to exploit these days it seems for many that they must work more than one job just to make ends meet because many employers wont hire people full time.Ever wonder why they ask those questions on applications;
Do you use SNAP, this that and the other.They are seeking people like that but not to give them a full time job.

The illegal immigrant issue will never end because too many people are making lots of money employing illegals.The last thing these companies would want is to see an increase in enforcement or a Mexico and Central America that is able to meet the needs of its citizens.