Why did the Industrial Revolution happen in Britain?

1not the leader

It's tempting to say Britain was simply the cleverest. But in the 1730s, Indian cloth made up about two thirds of the East India Company's imports from Asia. In cloth, Britain was the follower.

2the real question

So the real question isn't who was smartest. It's why machines paid for themselves in Britain first, when other places had skilled weavers and smiths too.

3coal

Start with coal. By 1800 Britain dug about eight times as much as Belgium, and near the mines its energy was among the cheapest anywhere.

4high wages

Now workers. British wages were high, so a machine that saved labour and ran on cheap coal paid off. Where labour was cheap and fuel dear, it often did not.

5the mine pump

The first big engine shows it. Around 1712, Newcomen's steam engine pumped water out of coal mines, and burned coal right there, where fuel cost almost nothing.

6Watt's upgrade

James Watt's improved engine used only about a quarter of the coal for the same work. Efficient engines then spread from mines into mills and ironworks.

7the whole idea

So here it is whole. Cheap coal and dear labour made machines profitable first in Britain. Historians still debate how much ideas, law and empire added to that.