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Labor’s response to Industrialism. Was the rise of industry good for American workers?. Working conditions. Garment factories had long hours and terrible working conditions In 1909 over 20,000 garment workers in New York City went on strike called the Uprising of 20,000. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
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Labor’s response to Industrialism
Was the rise of industry good for American workers?
Working conditions
• Garment factories had long hours and terrible working conditions
• In 1909 over 20,000 garment workers in New York City went on strike called the Uprising of 20,000.
• Strike lasted for 14 weeks…strikers were arrested and beaten
Some of the improvement in working conditions the strikers wanted
• Higher wages• Unlocked factory doors• Working fire escapes
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
1911- The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory caught on fire.
Doors were locked thus many of the female workers could not espace.
146 workers died in the fire.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/triangle/player/
Worker wages
• Typically 6 days a week, 10 hours per day• Workers earned about $1.00 a day• Workers typically did the same task all day
(division of labor)• Whirling shafts, slippery floors, spinning
blades, molten steel were injuring and killing• No safety glasses, not disability benefits, no
workers compensation
Coal workers
• Lungs breathed in coal that caused lung disease
• Mines were very dangerous to work in…many miners killed
• People did these jobs as immigrant workers would easily replace them
Child labor• Only a few states had laws governing child
labor • Children worked because family’s could not
survive on what parent’s made alone
Diversity in child labor
• 6 Year olds worked in Georgia’s cotton mills• Boys as young as 8 worked in the PA coal
mines• In the mines nearly one boy a day was killed.
Some push back…Newsboy strike of 1899
Strike!!!
• Newsies were not allowed to return unsold papers thus typically earned around 30 cents a day working late until the night.
• When New York publisher Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst raised the price to the Newsies leading to a Newsie strike that lasted several days with demonstrations on the Brooklyn Bridge for several days.
Living conditions of workers
• The many workers lived in tenement housingrun down apartment buildings of four to six stories usually housing four families on each floor.
• Disease flourished in cramped and often airless quarters…fire was a constant danger
Labor Movement
• Unions were formed…group of workers organized to protect the interest of its members.
• Typically higher wages, shorter hours, and better working conditions
Strike
• Typically used as a last resort.• Brings a stop to operations of a business.
Management
• Unions were kept under control by companies having workings sign Yellow Dog Contracts:
• Written pledges not to join a union. If not signed they were not hired by some.
Nationalization of Unions
• Local unions were hard to keep together.• During the economic growth of the late 1800’s
and early 1900’s there was more of a need for workers.
• Local unions would be brought under a national organization.
Knights of Labor• Skilled and unskilled labor; women and African
Americans• Used boycotts and strikes• Had over 700,000 members but declined due
to competition by 1886.
American Federation of Labor• Rival to the Knights of Labor• Organized skilled workers in a particular trade• 1 million members in 1900• Founded by Samuel Gompers to fight for
higher wages and shorter work days• Used negotiations, boycotts and strikes
Industrial Workers of the World
• More radical than other unions• Mostly lumberman, miners, textile workers, and
dockworkers• About 100,000 members• Followed socialist theories of Karl MarxSocialism-a political theory that advocatesownership of the means of production by thepeople rather than private ownership.• Boycotts, Strikes and sabotage
Collective Bargaining
Negotiations between employers and employee representation concerning wages, working conditions and other terms of employment.
Railroad strikes of 1877
• B&O Railroad cut wages in 1877.• Workers went on strike shutting down most of
the nation’s railroads.• Workers protested and destroyed property
resulting in President Rutherford B. Hayes calling in the Army to restore order.
• Over 100 people died in the violence of the strikes
Violent protests
Anarchists-people who reject all forms of government.
Haymarket Affair-Chicago 1886…union demonstration where a bomb exploded and several civilians died…four anarchists were executed.
Homestead Affair
1892-Iron and steelworkers in Homestead, PA.Carnegie’s people hired Pinkerton Guards to protect
the plant. They ended up clashing with strikers, nine strikers died in clashes but the Pinkerton Guards gave up the plant and town to the strikers.
PA Governor brings in the State Militia and Carnegie steel brings in non union workers to run the plants effectively shutting out the union.
Pullman Strike of 1894
Pullman Palace Car Company-made luxury cars for railroads.• Employees all lived in the company town of
Pullman.• Workers rented company-owned housing and
bought food and other goods from company stores.
• Often workers owed large debts to company
Wage cut…but not in rents
During tough economic times of 1894 Pullman cut wages by 25 percent.
Frustrated workers went on strike supported by Railworkers.
President Grover Cleveland (1894) sent federal troops into Chicago to break the strike. After a violent encounter the strike collapsed and the troops withdrew.
Workers made some gains
1890 Wage 32 cents per hour
1915 Wage 44 cents per hour
1890 average hours worked 55
1915 average hours worked 37
How the other half lives
Author Jacob Riis wrote about life in the Tenements of New York in the book How the Other Half Lives.
Muckrakers
President Teddy Roosevelt called Riis and other writers like him Muckrakers- “They raked the mud of society.”
The Jungle
“Muckraker” Upton Sinclair wrote The Jungle about unsanitary conditions in the meatpacking industry.
Called attention to the unregulated nature of the economy.
