During the early 1800s and late 1900s, the United States underwent huge economic and technological changes. The development of a society that relied on free enterprise and innovation led to new inventions and increasingly efficient businesses. These changes helped make the United States one of the world’s strongest economies and industrial centers. From Thomas Edison’s light bulb to Henry Ford’s affordable automobiles to Frederick Taylor’s time-study analysis, US innovations influenced business, industry, and technology in the United States throughout the 1900s and into the present. How does the business environment and technological innovation in the modern United States resemble the United States during the late 1800s and early 1900s? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the US culture of innovation throughout history and today?
