What was the point in having colonies? The Navigation Acts made that clear; the American colonies were supposed to provide a guaranteed supply of critical raw materials to the mother country, and to buy British manufactured goods. In short, the colonies existed to serve Great Britain; the colonists were second class citizens, both politically and economically. If the Revolution had failed, would that have changed?
There would have been plenty of smuggling, to be sure; the British didn’t have the resources to stop it. But there would have been no tariff, and far less manufacturing. As noted in my previous post, progress towards the single American market would have been much slower. Finally, American exports with the rest of the world would have been limited, which would have damaged American merchants. You can, therefore, attribute much of America’s economic growth to the success of the Revolution.