Andrew Carnegie's The Gospel Of Wealth

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Life Liberty and the Pursuit of happiness is the motto that the American people live by. It has been difficult to get to where we are now with the countless wars, conflicts, depressions, and over all the differences that many groups of individuals have. Along with many difficulties that our government has made, there are also many positive decisions that the government has made to help further our economy. In the Gilded Age which was from 1880 to 1929 the United States was in the mindset that the average American, who was poor and struggling to make ends meet, is able to become rich. Basicly the mindset that the wealthy men who held power wanted the everyday working American to dig themselves out of a hole and hope that they don’t dig themselves another one. The government had a very laissez faire policy which means that the U.S. government has no involvement in what goes on in the economy. Which leaves us with the question of who then runs the American economy? Many people have different views about what and who made the U.S. economy successful. In this time period many wealthy business owners …show more content…

He states in his novel “Gospel of Wealth” “... the law may be sometimes hard for the individual, it is best for the race, because it insures that survival of the fittest in every department” (Andrew Carnegie, Gospel of Wealth 1889). By this quote Carnage is saying that sometimes the law may seem as if they are going against you but the law is only trying to build you and create a better citizen and provider for the American economy. If you are unable to survive then it is meant that you are not trying hard enough and survival of the fittest will tear you down. Ultimately President Benjamin Harrison and the Presidents to follow had adopted this ideology. This type of thinking is known as social darwinism, the idea of survival of the