While women and children have always assisted in the work of the home,
it was not until the development of the factory system that they began
to work for wages outside of the family. From the earliest days the
preparation of food, spinning and weaving and making up of garments,
and other branches of domestic economy had been the peculiar tasks of
the housewife. With the removal of the textile industries from the
home to the factory and the invention of light-running machinery, many
women followed them and employment was found also for young children.
Thus with the inception of the modern factory system and machine
production there arose the problem of woman and child labor. In
England the evils of the early factory system were incredibly bad.
“The beginning of the present century,” wrote President Walker,[20]
“found children of five, and even of three years of age, in England,
working in factories and brickyards; women working underground in
mines, harnessed with mules to carts, drawing heavy loads; found the
hours of labor whatever the avarice of individual mill owners might
exact, were it thirteen, or fourteen, or fifteen; found no guards
about machinery to protect life and limb; found the air of the factory
fouler than language can describe, even could human ears bear to hear
the story.” Conditions were never so bad in this country as in England
owing to the later development of the system and prompter legislation
against its evils, and especially to the scarcity of labor which
compelled employers to make the conditions of labor more attractive.
The field of employment for women has been a constantly expanding one.
When Miss Harriet Martineau visited the United States in 1840 she
found only seven occupations open to women, namely, teaching,
needle-work, keeping boarders, work in the cotton mills, type-setting, 81
book-binding, and domestic service. Since that time the area has
widened until there is scarcely an occupation in which women are not
found except those closed to her by law or by physical inability. The
number of females 10 years of age and over engaged in gainful
occupations was 2,647,000 in 1880 or 14.7 per cent of the total female
population; this number more than doubled in the next twenty years,
being 5,319,000 in 1900 or 18.8 per cent of all. The largest number
employed was in domestic and personal service, and next to that in
manufacturing and mechanical pursuits, though even in that branch they
were most numerous in the traditional branches of woman’s work, as
dressmakers, seamstresses, etc. It is nevertheless in the
manufacturing industries that the most serious evils connected with
woman and child labor are found. The problems differ greatly in
different sections of the United States: in the Atlantic states the
greatest proportion of women as compared with men find employment and
give rise to special problems of women’s work; in the South child
labor is more conspicuous; while in the West both woman and child
labor are of relatively small importance.
An interesting question suggests itself at this point: Is the increase
in the employment of women at the expense of men? Are the women
crowding the men out of their occupations and taking their places? At
first inspection the statistics of occupations would seem to lead to
an affirmative answer, for the percentage of women breadwinners
increased from 13.5 per cent of all such in 1880 to 16.6 per cent in
1900, while that of the men fell from 80 to 77.3 per cent, and that of
the children remained about the same. The cause of the change in the
proportion of the sexes was not due, however, to any falling off in
the number of men, but to the great influx of women into the ranks of
wage-workers. In some lines of employment, like those of bookkeepers,
stenographers, typewriters, clerks, etc., there has undoubtedly been 82
an encroachment and men have been displaced. But on the other hand,
many occupations have been opened to men during the last fifty years
that were unknown before. Such have been the expanding fields of
railroad construction and operation, the steel industry, the
utilization of electricity, and other similar lines. In most of these
the muscular effort involved or the character of the work have kept
women out, but in other lines where special rapidity or lightness of
touch are required the women outnumber the men, as in the manufacture
of cotton goods, hosiery, hats and caps, etc. The development and
improvement of machinery has of course favored the employment of
women. Mr. John A. Hobson[21] asserts that “in modern machinery a
larger and larger amount of inventive skill is engaged in adjusting
machine-tending to the physical and mental capacity of women and
children.” He concludes that if the exploitation of these forms of
cheap labor had not been prevented by factory legislation and by
public disapproval, “the great mass of the textile factories of this
country [England] would have been almost entirely worked by women and
children.” As a matter of fact one of the reasons for the great
expansion of woman labor in the United States as well as England is
because it has been found cheaper than man’s labor. We are thus
brought face to face with a fundamental question in the discussion of
the problem--why are women paid lower wages than men?
As to the fact there is no doubt; one comparison taken from the Census
of 1900 will be sufficient to illustrate it: the annual average
earnings of men in mechanical and manufacturing industries were $490,
and of women $272 per annum. The more important question is why this
difference exists. A number of reasons suggest themselves at once. In
the first place women are less efficient than men and produce less; 83
hence they are paid less. In some industries, particularly those
requiring physical strength, women cannot compete successfully, and
those are usually the highest paid employments. Other well-paid
industries are regarded by men as essentially their own and social
pressure is applied to keep women out. Then, too, woman’s ambition to
attain industrial efficiency is not so great, owing to her expectation
of marriage and release from industrial life. Women are more often
absent from work owing to sickness and domestic claims upon their
time; this irregularity of employment tends to reduce their
efficiency. But even in employments where the efficiency of men and
women are admittedly equal the women receive lower wages in the
majority of cases. According to a report of the Bureau of Labor, out
of 100 cases where the women did the same work as the men and did it
as well, they received lower wages than the men in 80. This leads to
the consideration of a second group of causes, which have to do with
woman’s standard of living. One reason why she receives less is
because she is able and willing to live on less. Physiologically, Dr.
Atwater has said, man needs one-fifth more nutriment than woman.
Women’s wages are less because of their somewhat lower cost of
subsistence. But even aside from this fact, the frequent partial
dependence of women upon other members of their family for support
makes them willing to accept less and consequently reduces their
wages. The average American workingwoman is young, only about
twenty-two and a half years old, and after the age of twenty-five is
reached the number declines rapidly. That is to say, working girls
regard their employment as a temporary affair, remaining only about
five years on the average in the store or factory; during this time
they often live at home with their parents and are content to receive
a wage much smaller than a man would require as head of a household.
The third reason is, however, the most important, because it explains 84
at the same time the low economic position which woman occupies in the
industrial world. The narrowing of the field within which women can
readily find employment has the effect of greatly intensifying the
competition within that field. There is also a great reserve army of
potential women wage-earners, whom a slight increase of wages or force
of circumstances--loss of employment by the male members of the
family--will bring into the field as competitors. There is, in other
words, a constant over-supply of labor in most women’s industries,
which does not exist in any men’s industries except the most
unskilled. Women exhibit, furthermore, a comparative lack of mobility
from one industry to another, as well as from one locality to another.
According to Professor Smart, women are so unready to leave home that
their pay on one side of narrow Scotland is 50 per cent lower than on
the other side. In the same way, the flow of labor from one occupation
to another, which tends to equalize the advantages and rates of pay of
different employments, is far feebler among women than among men.
Finally, there is little organization among women. Their
individualistic, almost jealous, attitude to one another prevents
their combination and united action, while their submissive acceptance
of what is offered leads to apathy. They have only infrequently formed
unions and endeavored to substitute collective bargaining for
individual action. Women are therefore industrially in much the same
situation as unskilled, unorganized male laborers, and the remedy in
both cases would seem to be the same--education and organization.
The presence of a large supply of cheap woman labor undoubtedly has a
depressing effect upon men’s wages, and consequently upon the standard
of life of the whole laboring class. George Gunton[22] is authority
for the statement that “in proportion as the wife and children
contribute to the support of the family the wages of the father are 85
reduced.” The family wage tends to remain the same whether it is
earned by the father alone, or by the father with the assistance of
his wife and children. It is, however, not quite clear in most cases
whether the men’s wages are low because the women and children work,
or whether the women and children work because the men’s wages are
low. It may fairly be concluded, however, that the evil effects of low
wages for women are not confined to themselves but are felt by all
with whom they come in competition.
What conclusion shall we draw then, in view of all these facts, as to
the desirability of employment of women? The fact of their low wages
and industrial dependence is not sufficient to lead one to condemn it.
These are transitional phenomena and can be remedied. Women have
always worked--on the farm, in the home, in making household supplies.
When this work was taken over by the factory woman became a
wage-worker in the modern sense. “The census records in respect to the
labor of women, therefore, read in the light of collateral facts, are
a history of industrial readjustment rather than a record of the
relative extent of the employment of women, and it is impossible to
say, so far as the census figures are concerned, whether a larger
proportion of women are actively engaged in labor today than formerly
or not. The one fact which is clear is that factory or shop work is
displacing home work, and that this readjustment of industrial
conditions is leading to the employment of women outside the home in
constantly increasing numbers.”[23] The effect of this readjustment
has been to increase greatly the production of wealth. The production
of household supplies was removed from the family to the factory when
it was handed over to machinery and done better and more cheaply. If
the work of women thus released were expended for no useful purpose
society would gain only in the increased leisure of the women. But if 86
these then took up other new lines or set men free from old
employments so that they could turn to still different ones, then the
production of goods could be greatly increased. “Without women’s
help,” says Mr. George L. Bolen,[24] “their work in stores and offices
would be done by men taken from other employment. The latter’s present
work would have to be stopped to that extent, lessening the quantity
of goods produced by men. The effect would be the same as if a farmer
had to stop plowing two hours before noon to go to the house and cook
his dinner…. Women behind the counter, and at the typewriter,
release men for work that women cannot do.” From the standpoint of
woman herself, industrial independence must be regarded as a great
gain. Set free from the necessity of contracting marriage for the sake
of a home, and of depending upon mere sex attraction to attain that
end, she will develop her capacities more fully and when she does
enter upon marriage will do so as a result of mutual attraction. The
entrance of women into gainful occupations must be regarded as an
essential step in their own progress and the improvement of society.
Quite different must be our attitude towards child labor, which can
only be condemned as a waste of labor power and as stunting the
development of the children. The Census of 1870 stated for the first
time the number of children at work in the United States; there were
739,164 between the ages of 10 and 15 years, of whom 114,628 were
employed in manufactures. During the next decade the number increased
over 58 per cent to 1,118,356 children at work in all occupations. The
disclosure of such an undesirable tendency called forth restrictive
legislation in most of the states and the number declined materially
by 1890. Since 1890 however there has been a reversal of this tendency
back to the conditions of 1880, owing chiefly to the industrial 87
development of the South, where almost no factory legislation exists
as yet. In 1904 there were 1,752,187 children at work between the ages
of 10 and 15 years, or almost one-fifth of all the children of those
ages. The evils connected with child labor are the long hours--usually
11 or 12 hours a day where no restrictive legislation exists--and the
exhausting and often dangerous work. The effect on the health of the
children of monotonous and exhausting toil before their muscles are
set and their frames knit up is thoroughly bad; they are stunted and
deformed and prematurely aged. Many of the occupations, too, in which
child laborers are most numerous, are dangerous or injurious, as tin
can factories, saw mills, paper box factories, type foundries, and
tobacco establishments. Second only to the physical effects of child
labor is the mental and moral injury suffered not merely by the child
but also by society in depriving these youthful laborers of a thorough
education. While it is well that children should be kept busy, there
is no compensating reward either in money wage or preparation for
adult life in such monotonous, profitless drudgery. The influence of
the competition of children upon wages is leveling, and their
employment indicates either a willingness on the part of employers and
parents to exploit this cheap and defenseless form of labor, or a
backward state of civilization. Such an evil can be cured only by
determined public opposition, by the passage of laws forbidding all
labor by children under a certain age, say 15 (except possibly in
agricultural or housework), compelling school attendance, and
providing for careful inspection. Most of all is needed an aroused
public conscience.
Labor legislation is the most effective method of improving the
conditions of employment, and to a consideration of this subject we
must devote the remainder of this section. We have already seen that
the fundamental principle of our modern wage system is freedom of
contract. This is guaranteed in our federal and state constitutions 88
as both a personal and a property right. As a result of this fact the
courts have generally declared unconstitutional any legislation,
designed to protect the interests of labor, that seemed to abrogate
this freedom of contract or that savored of class legislation. Efforts
to improve the condition of labor by legislation have therefore met
with especial obstacles in this country. On the whole, however, means
have been discovered of evading these constitutional restrictions when
it has seemed clearly demanded by the welfare of society, and the
history of labor legislation in this country is one of fairly steady
progress. The early laws were practically confined to imprisonment for
debt, mechanics’ liens, the hours of education of children employed in
factories, and similar matters. Nothing noteworthy was accomplished
until 1866 when Massachusetts passed an eight-hour child labor law for
children under fourteen; in 1874 she passed a ten-hour law for women
and children under eighteen, engaged in manufacturing establishments,
and in 1877 enacted the first factory inspection act, which has since
been copied in about twenty-four states, and without which mere
legislation is of little avail.
The factory acts may be divided into two classes, those that endeavor
to secure the safe or healthful manner of conducting a business, and
those that attempt to limit the occupations, the hours, and the
methods of payment of the workers. Under the first head come such
matters as fire protection, ventilation, guarding of machinery,
inspection of boilers and mines, etc. Such legislation and inspection
have in many states been extended to churches, schoolhouses, hotels,
theaters and public buildings. The second group includes those laws
which are usually meant when factory acts are referred to. In England
there has been a very steady development and extension of such
legislation, beginning in 1802, when Peel’s Act tried to protect the
health and morals of the pauper apprentices in the cotton mills; this 89
was extended to all young people in textile industries in 1833, to
women in 1844, then to all large industries in 1864, and to smaller
ones in 1867, and finally in 1878 these various provisions were
codified into a complete factory act, regulating the health and safety
of the laboring people generally. In the United States the movement
was considerably later and has not been so uninterrupted. But today
laws limiting the number of hours of labor to eight have been passed
by the Federal Government and fifteen of the states for all those
engaged on public works. Attempts to fix the hours of labor of adult
male workers have usually been declared unconstitutional, for the
reasons stated above, except in especially dangerous or unhealthful
occupations, as bakeries, mines, smelters and similar lines.
Consequently the men have been forced to rely largely upon their own
efforts for the redress of industrial grievances; in this fact lies
one explanation of the growth and strength of labor organizations in
this country. On the other hand, legislation in behalf of women and
especially children--wards of the state--has usually been held
constitutional by the courts, and has had a more extended application.
About twenty of the states have regulated the length of the working
day for women and children. Special child labor laws limit the age
below which employment is illegal, usually between ten and fourteen
years of age; and provide for a minimum of education before a child
can be employed. About half the states provide for factory inspection
to see that the provisions of the various acts are lived up to. In
general we may conclude that by the passage of such legislation
society has definitely decided that there are some conditions of
employment that cannot be safely left to free contract or to
collective bargaining between employer and employe, but that they must
be regulated by society itself on the broad grounds of social welfare.