TCI Reading excerpt: CH 17.1 Working Class

TCI Reading excerpt: CH 17.1 Working Class During the Industrial Revolution, there was a shift in the classes of society. Since the industrialized processes for producing goods required expensive machines, only those with capital could own them. These owners still needed human and animal labor to run these machines, but since they owned the only means of production, they held a great amount of control over their workers. This led to increasing inequality between people who owned the means of production and those who engaged in wage labor and subsistence farming. Working Conditions on the Factory Floor The working class included men, women, and children who provided the skill and the muscle that enabled industrial productivity to reach new heights and make employers exceedingly wealthy. Yet, those same employers often treated their workers—their human resources—as if they were merely pieces of the machinery. Industrial workers had an exhausting schedule. Workers were expected to show up at the workplace six days a week, on time, and to put in a full day—typically 12 hours for much of the 1800s. For their efforts, workers earned approximately $1 a day. The work itself was repetitive and boring because, unlike farming or craft work in which a worker did a variety of tasks, the factory system relied on a division of labor. In essence, this system divided production into separate tasks, with one task assigned to each worker. Factory owners designed the system in this manner in order to maximize output and efficiency. Workers were then expected to operate at the same level of efficiency and accuracy as the machines they ran. Workers often operated in hazardous environments. Whirling shafts, slippery floors, spinning blades, and molten steel all had the potential to injure or kill. Worker safety was not of great concern. Workers were not provided helmets or safety glasses, and those who were hurt or disabled received little to no financial compensation for their injuries. Factory owners believed that simply paying wages fulfilled their obligation to workers. Industrial processing often created toxic gases and dust as well. Workers in textile mills, for example, had no choice but to inhale cotton dust all day. Worse yet was the situation of coal miners. Perhaps unsurprisingly, textile workers and miners often suffered from lung diseases, and workers in cramped, unventilated shops faced the constant threat of contagious diseases such as tuberculosis. Laborers tolerated such adversity and hardships because they risked losing their jobs if they protested. Due to the influx of immigrants in the country, employers had little trouble replacing a dissenting worker. Impact on Women and Children In the cottage industries that existed before industrialization, women and children performed vital tasks in the home workshop. At the start of the Industrial Revolution, they continued to take part in the manufacture of goods. Factory owners could rely on them to perform unskilled labor, and they could pay them a lower wage than men, making them desirable employees. The New England textile industry hired many women to run the machines that spun and wove cloth. Most of these female mill workers, who became known as “factory girls,” were young and unmarried. Nevertheless, many women were put out of work during the shift from the domestic system to the factory system. Some managed to find work outside the home, often as household servants or teachers. Some started a laundry service in their own home. By the early 1900s, only 20 percent or so of women continued to work in manufacturing. Of these, many labored in sweatshops—small factories, typically in the garment industry, where wages were low and conditions unhealthy. Children worked in industry as well, often for two main reasons. First, even with both parents employed, a typical family could barely survive financially, and a child’s wages, though meager, made a crucial difference. Second, because children earned less than adults, factory owners were happy to employ them and exploit cheaper labor. However, even for lesser wages, children were expected to do the same amount of work as adults. Child workers were exposed to some of the most dangerous working conditions. Because TCI Reading excerpt: CH 17.1 Working Class they were small, they could squeeze inside running machinery to make repairs. Young miners driving mules through tunnels risked being crushed by loads of coal. Children also suffered from a lack of education. Working in factories, or in other industries, didn’t leave children any time to go to school. Since most children began working in factories as early as six years old, this meant many received no form of education at all. Throughout the 1800s, critics voiced concerns about child labor. In response, laws that set a minimum age or number of hours per week for child workers were enacted. In Britain in 1833 the Factory Act was passed, restricting child labor to children older than nine years of age, and reducing the number of hours per week for children aged nine to thirteen years old. In America, laws varied from state to state but mainly focused on minimum ages in order to keep children in school longer. But these laws had little impact. Even where child labor laws existed, companies often ignored them, or the government poorly enforced them. By around 1900, Western societies had generally come to the conclusion that industrial labor was primarily the province of men. Middle-class families began to think of home as a separate sphere for women and children, where they would be protected from the evils of the industrial environment. Women were discouraged from paid labor, and children were sent to school. In poorer families, however, both women and children continued to work in the paid labor force. Urbanization and Its Effects Before the Industrial Revolution, manufacturing took place largely in the countryside, in home workshops. Towns served mainly as centers of government and commerce. With industrialization, the town became the main location of manufacturing. Factories attracted a steady stream of workers from the countryside, where the agricultural revolution had reduced the need for farm labor. These migrants settled near the factories, greatly expanding the population of existing towns and cities or creating towns where none had previously existed. Industrialization also encouraged mass migration from one country to another. Throughout the 1800s, the United States was a major destination for immigrants. Some traveled across the Pacific Ocean from China and Japan. Most, however, came from Europe—even from industrializing countries such as Germany, where too many people competed for too few jobs. The growing United States offered factory work, but it also lured immigrant farmers to its wide-open spaces out West. The explosion in the number of factories and the flood of migrants to factory towns resulted in rapid urbanization. Within those newly urbanized centers, living conditions were often appalling. Unlike today, government regulation, or legal restriction, of industry was practically nonexistent. Outdoors, smoke belching from factories polluted the air. Chemicals and other industrial wastes fouled rivers, lakes, and coastal waters. So did raw sewage from rapidly expanding towns and cities. Indoors, living conditions in urban areas were just as bad. Workers often lived in slums—heavily populated parts of a city marked by filth and squalor. In the slums, workers lived in tenements, or filthy, overcrowded apartment buildings of four to six stories, that usually housed four families on each floor. Tenements were often unclean and extremely dangerous places to live. Only a few rooms had windows to provide light and fresh air, while the rest remained dark and airless. Many tenements also lacked a sewer service, and the only source of water was a single faucet in a courtyard. Living in such close quarters without proper sanitation encouraged the spread of communicable diseases such as cholera, smallpox, and typhoid fever, which killed many infants and young children. Fires were also a constant worry in the cramped spaces. Yet, few government programs for dealing with public-health issues existed until the second half of the 1800s. Urban death rates soared.