Which colonies were profitable?

[CerberusIV]

Originally posted by Smiley
how much were people smoking back then?

Not sure (presumably they died of other causes before lung cancer could develop!) but planting tobacco was the turning point for the Jamestown colony that made it viable and provoked the larger scale colonisation of Virginia.


I know more about the British Empire than others so that's what I can comment on. In the early days the merchants (including members of the aristocracy) were very keen to make money and they controlled political influence so colonies were established by private trading ventures, then increasingly supported by the state.

Control of luxury resources (those it was profitable to ship in slow sailing vessels) was very profitable, especially if a near monopoly could be established. The Anglo-Dutch wars of the late 17th C and the Seven Years War were largely about trade and resulted in gains for British merchants at the expense of their French and Dutch rivals.

Colonies weren't always established for profit. Australia was simply a dumping ground for the large numbers of criminals building up in British jails after the loss of the American colonies. Only wool (which didn't actually rely on forced labour by the convicts) made Australia anything like profitable.

India was profitable for the East India Company but after the government takeover was less so due to the increasing cost of running the country. The main attractions of India as a colony in the 19th C were that it had a well developed taxation system, unlike many African colonies, so it was financially self supporting and provided a large army which the British could use to police their other colonies in the region at relatively little cost (or political fallout - as British troops didn't have to be used).

So there's no simple answer that covers the whole history of colonialism.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Bosh

Most of the colonies that weren't profitable for the metropole were profitable for certain well-connected people in the metropole (people in the bureaucracy, businessmen, military figures etc. etc.) which was often the whole point...

Agreed and that is why we have the institutional support for the Iraq war today. It will be a huge money loser for the state but certain well connected defense contractors who donate to Republicans will make truck loads of cash. That becomes the point. Well connected elites fleece the nation for personal profit.

[Dinner]

The American colonies produced raw materials and consumed British manufactured goods. They were the primary market outside of the UK and that's why so many British industrialists were against the war to begin with. The trade was fairly balanced though it took several navigation laws to bring it so and those navigation laws upset producers in the US.

Raw materials like lumber (especially old growth timber useful as navel stores), grains, furs, cotton, and tabacco were very profitable while the burgening population of the new world bought a lot of finished goods. That was a fairly balanced trade, however, once the colonies started producing their own finished goods things started to get out of wack.

[molly bloom]

The islands in the Caribbean produced great profits for European merchants and slave traders- so important were they, that the British empire was almost persuaded to hang on to Guadeloupe rather than take the territories it had acquired in New France, at the end of the Seven Years' War.

This is also why the French invested so much in trying to reconquer Haiti/St. Domingue after the slave revolt.

The islands exported ginger from the late 16th Century onwards, then also sugar, molasses and rum, and later coffee and nutmeg.

In fact, the nutmeg trade was so profitable, that the Dutch swapped a tiny nutmeg growing island in the Indonesian archipelago for a colony in the Americas- Manhattan.

And look where that led....

[VetLegion]

Thanks everyone for the replies, they're quite interesting

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Oerdin


Agreed and that is why we have the institutional support for the Iraq war today. It will be a huge money loser for the state but certain well connected defense contractors who donate to Republicans will make truck loads of cash. That becomes the point. Well connected elites fleece the nation for personal profit.

That's pretty damned simplistic. The vast majority of "well-connected" Republican donors lose money because of Iraq just like the vast majority of the rest of the country does. Try to think or at least keep the conspiracy theories you are being bombarded with straight. Neither Bush nor Cheney invaded Iraq for campaign contributions. It's a lot safer and easier to simply cuddle up with some quiet little sleazy industry or to sell access (or the appearance of access) to the politically unsophisticated ala Abramson. Wars are extremely public, emotional for the electorate and dangerous. Not a good risk for a master manipulator bent on pocketing a few million.

[:) Smiley]

Which brings up a yet unmentioned reason for colonization - religious nuttery.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by molly bloom
This is also why the French invested so much in trying to reconquer Haiti/St. Domingue after the slave revolt.

Until that revolt, Haiti was one of France's most prosperous colonies. Following its loss, it made sense to the French to sell New Orleans & the Louisiana territories to the Americans because their main purpose was a staging area for the war in Haiti. Ironic, isn't it, that Haiti is now one of the poorest countries in the world.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Skanky Burns
All of my colonies are. I get them up to level 12 mines using their own resources then start shipping the resources back to my homebase. After a weeks investment they quickly start paying for themselves.

I just saw this

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Sikander

That's pretty damned simplistic. The vast majority of "well-connected" Republican donors lose money because of Iraq just like the vast majority of the rest of the country does. Try to think or at least keep the conspiracy theories you are being bombarded with straight. Neither Bush nor Cheney invaded Iraq for campaign contributions. It's a lot safer and easier to simply cuddle up with some quiet little sleazy industry or to sell access (or the appearance of access) to the politically unsophisticated ala Abramson. Wars are extremely public, emotional for the electorate and dangerous. Not a good risk for a master manipulator bent on pocketing a few million.

The war has netted Cheney millions. He swore up and down he didn't have any Haliburton stock but low and behold it turns out he had tens of thousands of shares all worth millions.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Oerdin
The American colonies produced raw materials and consumed British manufactured goods. They were the primary market outside of the UK.

They were ?

Hmm, I'd like to see your evidence for this, just out of curiosity.