It's amusing to me when people forget that there have always been at least 2 Americas. How many times have you heard about how this country was founded for religious freedom and the colorful happy tale of the Pilgrims and how Thanksgiving was the start of a new nation. Put aside the myths of religious freedom and the whole happy family Thanksgiving crap and let's just look at the assumption that this was the birth of a new nation. Plymouth colony was founded in the late winter of 1620 by those wonderful folks aboard the Mayflower.
           Jamestown was founded in Virginia in 1607  and became the first permanent English settlement.  That's a good 13 years before the Pilgrims made their journey.
            Either way you look at it, both colonies were created for one basic purpose to make money for the King and the shareholders in the companies that were granted the charters to found colonies. Money.  Once tobacco was cultivated around 1612 in Virginia labor became a problem so we introduce indentured servants. Later of course slavery is established.
           Moving away from those issues, the basic fact is this country was established by people who sought to make money.  Charles Beard was one of the first people to examine the economic motives for Revolution in the colonies and while he was much criticized for it he was on to something. There is no denying that economics played an important role in fomenting revolution.  That isn't to say that human rights and a yearning to be free were not factors,  they were very important.
           It does bug me when people focus so much on the Pilgrims and ignore the economic motives that helped establish this country to begin with. Because those same motives play an important role to this day. Just as people value freedom and human rights in America so too do people value money and the acquisition of it. Even if it means trampling on certain rights and created indentured servants of a new kind.