USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -History of Mercantilism. First seen in Europe during the 1500s, mercantilism was based on the idea that a nation’s wealth and power were best served by increasing exports and limiting imports. Mercantilism replaced the feudal economic system in Western Europe.

Detailed explanation-2: -This system dominated Western European economic thought and policies from the sixteenth to the late eighteenth centuries. The goal of these policies was, supposedly, to achieve a “favorable” balance of trade that would bring gold and silver into the country and also to maintain domestic employment.

Detailed explanation-3: -Mercantilism, an economic theory that rejected free trade and promoted government regulation of the economy for the purpose of enhancing state power, defined the economic policy of European colonizing countries.

Detailed explanation-4: -Under mercantilism, colonies were important because they produced raw materials for the mother country, goods that the country would have to import otherwise (things like grain, sugar, or tobacco). The colonies also gave the mother country an outlet for exports, which increased jobs and industrial development at home.