Goals Of Mercantilism

Mercantilism Mercantilism was the standard system used for trade during the colonial period. The idea was that in order to gain wealth, a country must export more goods than it imported and increase its gold and silver reserves. For this paper, I will be writing about how mercantilism functioned by focusing on the relationship between England and their colonies. I chose to write specifically about England because my group was a colony under England during the mercantilism simulation. Mercantilism was a one sided form of trade that only profited the empires ,and not the colonies that they were exploiting for their recourses. The way trade through mercantilism worked was by having the colonies provide raw goods to England in order for …show more content…
The first being the idea of increasing a countries wealth by increasing gold and silver reserves. The second was to export more goods than goods being imported. England believed that the more gold and silver the country had, the more powerful it would become. England also was making profit buy increasing how many goods they exported, and buy taxing the goods that they imported . Britain would import gold and silver from the colonies, and tax the merchants that brought the gold and silver back to gain profit. By restricting the colonies to trade with England, England was able to gain a monopoly over the gold and silver being brought back from the colony. Achieving this monopoly over american gold and silver was a crucial point in increasing the gold and silver …show more content…
By creating monopolies the British were able to reap all the profits that could be made from the colonies. British held their monopoly over the colonist by keeping them dependent on England. The British held their monopoly by already having a monopoly over finished goods. By excluding foreign competition they forced themselves to be the only supplier of retail finished goods that the colonist needed. Britain also benefited from the mercantilism system because they had the power to submit the colonies into providing everything they needed to run a successful economy. They restricted the colonist right to free trade in order to make a bigger profit. Essentially the colonies were a cheap unlimited source of raw goods that Britain could exploit. England had a monopoly over the colonies and used the profits gained to increase military power. With increased military power, England was able to deter smugglers and also eliminate international competition while trading with the