Pros And Cons Of Westward Expansion In Canada

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Throughout the world, there are many railroads being built. During Westward Expansion, in 1881, the CPR (Canadian Pacific Railway) was in production. In Canada, mainly British Columbia (B.C), the government was having economic issues and they relied on Chinese immigrants to build the CPR because it was “cheaper” than hiring white workers to build the railroad. The Chinese were not the only ones affected; the Indigenous were also being affected by getting kicked out of their homes as the land was needed for the railroad. The government took advantage of the Chinese and Indigenous peoples. The CPR added many benefits to Canada, it also negatively affected the people living in Canada, and the Chinese workers hired to build the railroad. CPR is …show more content…

Furthermore, even if the Chinese were coming to Canada to help build the railroad, they still had to pay the head tax. It would take the workers about 500 days to pay off the Head Tax. That is if they spent none of their money. Considering that the workers only made 10 cents a day (in pure profit), it would take them 5,000 days just to get their money back. That was not the only thing that the government did to try to make the Chinese not able to come to Canada. After the Head Tax, the government wanted to reduce the amount of Chinese entering Canada. In Canada there was the Chinese Exclusion Act, formally called the Chinese Immigration Act (1923). This act made it so that the Chinese people were not allowed to enter Canada (until 1947).” (AHSNB, 2006). Family separation started to become very common as Chinese were not allowed to enter Canada. Their family back home were not able to come see them in Canada. The Canadian government not only mistreated the Chinese when they entered Canada, they split up families too. All of the other races were allowed to immigrate into Canada with no problem/no fee. It

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