World Geography

Mexico

Mexico was originally settled by the native peoples-Mayan, Aztec, etc. Then Cortes came and conquered the Aztec for Spain. Mexico was part of the Spanish Empire for 300 years. The huge draw for them was the natural resources such as gold and silver. In 1821, Mexico finally gained independence. But even afterwards, the land was unequally distributed; the rich owned land and had peasant workers. A new constitution finally redistributed the land to all the people in 1917.

Before the Spanish came, the natives were quite advanced. The Aztec built cities with temples and practiced human sacrifice. The Spanish destroyed the Aztec capital and built Mexico City on top of its ruins. They brought along their language and religion with them, both of which are still dominant in Mexico today. There is a large mestizo population there. Mestizo are people of Spanish and Native heritage.

The two main challenges in their economy is the gap between the rich and the poor and developing an industrial economy from a traditional agricultural one. More and more people move to the cities for economic opportunities. Mexico is big in the oil industry and uses its profits for development. There's also many maquiladoras there as well. Maquiladoras are factories that assemble important materials to make a final product, so it can be exported to the U.S. or some other country. Mexico also takes part in NAFTA (The North American Free Trade Agreement). NAFTA is an important agreement requiring cooperation regarding economic and trade issues in North America.

Today, people are leaving Mexico to find jobs in the United States because of the growing populations and the shortages of jobs. Workers often send money back home to their families to make life easier. And although 85% of school age kids there go to school, there is little higher education available for most people.