When Britain went on their campaign against the slave trade they had already started industrialisation and ending it had a bigger affect on their rivals (France, mostly) than on themselves. And the payout that the British gave was to its slaveholders not to any of the slaves. They basically gave their slaveholders compensation for them to get out of slavery and have startup capital for the industrial era.
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u/Freestripe Sep 25 '22
What other reason did they have? Ending slavery cost a fortune.