Why did people go to the Land of opportunity?

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Kirandeep Dhillon   10L

Why did people go to the ‘Land of opportunity’?

In the 1900’s and onwards, people went to the USA; the ‘land of opportunity’, because they wanted to pursue their dreams. The USA was said to have been a free country in which people were allowed freedom of speech, press and religion, thus luring immigrants from all around the world to the USA and away from their home countries due to the fact that they may have faced persecution, there was lack of space, food or jobs and that there was inequality in lifestyles between the rich and poor. This attracted people, thus they immigrated.

The main reason that many immigrants from around the world, mainly Europe, were migrating to the USA was because they faced persecution in their home country.  People were discriminated due to political or religious reasons thus meaning people did not want to stay in the country as this interfered with their life and caused problems for themselves and their families.  For example, many eastern European Jews were being discriminated due to their religion in countries such as Russia. ‘Pogroms’ (attacks) in Russia and other countries were held on the Jews. This meant that many Jews went to the USA, as well as many Russians, who did not want to get involved with pogroms.  Also, many Jews were immigrating to America because of the build up of the Nazis in Germany. Furthermore, many Italians went to America due to persecution in Italy and to escape its fascist political views and government. The USA promised freedom in many ways, such as they were free to practise their religion and have a freedom of speech and press, therefore this pulled mainly young hopeful people who wanted to live life freely, to the USA and as a result of persecution in many countries, a massive amount of immigrants came to the USA to start over in life and obtain a better job than the ones in their home countries at the time, which could be found in the USA.

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Another reason for the immigration to the USA was that there was a mass of young unemployed workers in Europe towards the end of the 1800s, who wanted a job. Some lost their jobs due to the introduction of new machinery in factories and farms which replaced their work. Also, due to economic depression, wages were low for people with jobs, which did not suffice in their need to feed themselves and their families.  People heard that the ‘land of opportunity’ had well paid jobs for people who were skilled and unskilled. People who sought a better life were lured ...

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