Industrialization and Diversification  Work and Labour  Trade
and Commerce  Society and Culture  For about three hundred years
after Cabot's discovery, economic activity in Newfoundland was
carried on from European bases.  The Newfoundland-based fishery
of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was pursued
mainly by family-based enterprises.  Because of the Depression,
by the mid-1930s, one native-born Newfoundlander had moved
abroad for every six that stayed at home.  It was largely the
promise of a better economy that a bare majority of
Newfoundlanders voted for confederation with Canada in 1949.
Despite confederation with Canada, throughout the last half-
century Newfoundland's economy has been characterized by low
average incomes and high levels of unemployment.  For
information on the developing economy of Newfoundland and
Labrador visit the Department of Industry, Trade and Technology.
Although it is often described in different terms, the
expedition that led to the “discovery” of Newfoundland wa