Business vs. Workers

Working conditions and the growth of unions in the Gilded Age

The Changing Face of Labor• In the pre-Civil War era, most factory workers

were skilled laborers…this changed starting in the 1870s!

• Mechanized mass production did not require as much skilled labor

• Cities attract rural Americans in search of work and opportunity (growth of cities = urbanization)

• Result: workforce increasingly made up of women, immigrants, and children

Working ConditionsBusiness owners ran factories as cheaply as possible (low costs high profits) at the expense of workers

• Workers bought own tools• No safety equipment• Sweatshops • Low wages for long hours

• 10 hour workday (1880s)• In 1890, the average annual

wage for a family of four was $380; subsistence level was $530

Child LaborChild labor was particularly common in this period, with little or no safety measures taken to protect them!- 1910 – 25% of all American children had full-time jobs in factories

What do you think the author of this cartoon is trying to say about children’s labor conditions?

Labor Unions

• Result of workers’ discontent = labor unions• Idea of a labor union not new…so what made the

unions of the Gilded Age different?• National organizations

• Knights of Labor (1869)• American Federation of Labor (1886)

• More workers allowed to join

• Goals of labor unions: negotiate for better wages and working conditions

Knights of Labor v. AFL

Knights of Labor American Federation of Labor

• Founded by Uriah Stephens in 1869• First national labor union• Membership open to almost all workers. Management, unskilled workers, women, blacks all welcome.• Goal: reform working conditions and society at large • Methods included strikes and protests

• Founded by Samuel Gompers in 1886• National labor union• Membership open to skilled workers only• Goal: reform working conditions. Less concerned about reforming society• Methods included strikes and boycotts• Still around today

Workers take action!

• Why did President Hayes call in the federal troops to stop the strike?

• Strike failed, but signified growing power of unions

• 1884-1885: other strikes by workers on the Union Pacific Railroad triggers growth in membership of Knights of Labor

Depression after Panic of 1873 prompted railroads to cut pay of workers, resulting in the Railroad Strike of 1877

Union setbacks• Business leaders feared the growth of

unions would spread socialism, an economic system in which workers are also owners of the business

• Haymarket Affair (1886): conflict between police and protesters resulting from a lockout by the McCormick Harvester Company

• Bomb that sparked riot blamed on the Knights of Labor, socialists, and anarchists, resulting in the arrest of hundreds

• After the Haymarket Affair, opposition to unions increased and membership of the Knights of Labor started to decline The Haymarket Martyrs

Other (less successful) strikes• Homestead Strike (1892)

• Workers at Carnegie’s steel mills in Homestead, PA faced a wage cut, which their union refused

• Four month struggle that also included armed conflict• Eventually the strike was broken, weakening the union

• Pullman Strike (1894): • Depression prompted Pullman Palace Car Company to cut

wages 25% with no concurrent drop in rent for workers• Workers struck, and all railway workers across the country

refused to handle Pullman cars… rail traffic was halted• President Cleveland had to send in troops to break strike• Public opinion turned against them