-While the Gilded Age is known for launching achievements from many of the world's most accomplished entrepreneurs, inventors and thinkers, the federal government of the United States has been criticized for its lack of regulatory influence during this area.
-The lack of federal authority in the Gilded Age contributed to an even greater lack of economic regulation. Factories that rose to success during the Civil War resulted in the Panic of 1893, during which the American economy came close to doubling in size.
-Economic competition intensified and a small minority rose to power and drove many of their competitors to bankruptcy. Critics of the federal government cited a lack of economic regulation that kept the most prominent industrialists from dominating the economy. It was believed that these “captains of industry” profited through often unfair tactics in an economy with few laws governing fair business practices.
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