Westward Expansion
Compared to its European competitors, America had much more geographical room for development in the late 1800s. Many cities in the West, such as San Francisco and Los Angeles, were just beginning a developmental stage, and there were not even 50 states in the Union yet. The high availability of land and resources in the continental United States not only left a lot of room for development, but also ensured that land prices remained reasonable, which allowed new industries to spring up in the midst of the resource networks that supplied them.
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