Child Labor in the 1800's

As early as the 1830’s Child Labor in the U.S. was already starting to arise. In rural communities child labor on the farm was common, children being employed in factories or mills didn’t seem to be much of a concern to people. In 1830 laws were passed prohibiting children to be hired in an industrial or factory type setting. By 1800, some states passed a large amount of laws prohibiting child labor. Often times these laws did not apply to immigrants so they were often abused on the immigrants which lead to the immigrants living in poor places working for long hours for very little pay. Immigrant or not, child labor back in the 1800’s was a way of life.

During the late 1800’s and the early 1900’s child labor was a social issue that developed in the United States. In the early 1900’s, so many children ages 16 and under were working in American mine and factories. Our kids should not be forced to work at such an early age, they need education and a good childhood that they will always remember. Some children that are as young as 4 years old are being forced to work in crammed, dangerous factories. These factories are full of poisonous fumes and diseases that can obviously kill. Kids as young as 13 are being forced to work around 13 hours a day. Working these 13 hours is exactly what most adults are working at the time. Kids are also earning a lower wage since they are minors, employers

Child labor was very common and popular especially in the late 1800s and early the 1900s even though many people were not aware of the dangers. We can define child labor as work that deprives children of their childhood, their potential and their dignity, and cause to their physical and mental development. Children are the base of a country but in a developing country child labor is an issue that has yet to disappear. Most of the children remain illiterate because of their poor economic condition and parents do not have enough money to spend on the education of their children, rather they send their children for work so that they could earn some money during their poor economic condition. The objective of my research paper is to raise awareness

During the 18 and beginning of the 19th century in certain regions of the U.S child labor made up more than 40 percent of the population (Wolensky). That’s almost half of the working population. Since the beginning of time children have always been known to help their families with domestic tasks. Most of these kids worked in factories because they were easy to control and paid less than adults. Kids earned less than half of what adults made in the work force. In these factories they usually cleaned under and inside machines while functioning because of their small size.. That’s how these kids felt as it was described in a article in our history book. They were always in danger of getting hurt or even dying, which many did. Kids as young

A young boy of seven years old, whose occupation as scavenger, was to gather incessantly from the factory grounds , the debris of cotton that may limit the work. While the roaring machinery passed overhead , and when this is persis fully done, and the cranium , body, and the extremities carefully bound to the floor, the unfaltering movement, but intimidating mass, may pass over the dazed head and trembling body without come into contact with it.” To many of us this text belongs to in the past. This is true ,this was published in the 1800’s in eastern Europe, however it would come as more of a surprise that child labor is still active in our present day society . According to Krugman several thousand men, women and children reside on Smokey

As the industrial revolution emerged, this is when the number of child workers increased significantly. “it indicates that at least 18 percent of these children were employed in 1900” (Trattner 3). At the time, this was a large number of the American workforce despite their age. On the other hand, children whose families were impoverished make up a large majority of the eighteen percent.

When most people hear child labor, their minds automatically think of places such as Africa, China, India, and Mali, but the truth is that even in the United States of America, it was a big problem. Child labor peaked especially between the nineteenth and twentieth century on account of the Industrial Revolution. Employers were in dire need of workers, and parents were in dire need of money to sustain themselves, therefore more and more children were forced to work. Children went out and worked in mines, factories, and farms under dangerous and treacherous conditions. People began disapproving and demanded laws to regulate child labor and a reform movement was started.

In the year 1870, 739,164 children between the ages of 10 and 15 were employed in the United falling just short of 20 percent of the workforce. Thirty years later in the 1900 census, two million children were working in mills, mines, fields, factories, stores, and on city streets across the United States. But with increasing numbers of children being put into the workforce, the conditions in which they worked rapidly declined. Such rapidly declining conditions were due to “compulsory education laws, massive inflows of inexpensive immigrant labor, and technological innovations such as the widespread use of telephones instead of messenger boys.” Primarily being employed in the farming, factories, and transportation, industrial safety became a major issue. Around 1900, industrial jobs caused approximately 30,000 deaths and 1 million injuries per year, and factory owners seldom took any responsibility. The most dangerous industry was amongst the railroads where “Fires, machinery accidents, train wrecks and other misfortunes were common.” Because such a large portion of the work force was made up of children, the formation of “the child-saving movement” began, and started to gain some national momentum.

It has since been a social issue that many have struggled to face, despite the recent changes in the social law and ideology. However, this wasn’t always the case, because society viewed child labor as being tolerable instead of unethical. In fact, in the early 1800’s children were already working long grueling hours as a way of supporting themselves and the family. Children were often subjected to work 50-70 hour weeks, but this was seen most prominent in poorer families where the cost of having a child was too much of burden for certain families to carry. This would often result in families giving up their children by turning them over to factory mill owners, where they would be able make enough to support themselves and only that.

In the early 1900’s, children were often forced to work long hours with very little pay. In addition, the conditions in these factories were considered highly dangerous. Because the children were required to work in these labor conditions to support their families, they were unable to get the education they deserved. The working conditions during the Industrial Revolution were poor; however, the working environment for minors today has significantly improved. There is a long list of physical demanding jobs that are not allowed to employ children.

During the Industrial Revolution in America, industrialization and urban development took place at an unprecedented pace. Due to the increasing demand for production and the desire for cheap labor, the number of factories increased. As a consequence, the number of child laborers drastically increased. Child labor became more widespread and it eventually became a staple of the American economy. As the use of child labor increased, it began to be scrutinized by organizations, like the National Child Labor Committee, who criticized the method and claimed that it damaged the individual child and the society as a whole. Those who opposed child labor saw the correlation between the long hours/dangerous conditions and the vast lack of education (and

Child Labor During the Industrial Revolution After the Civil War, the spark of the Industrial Revolution occurred. Many new ideas and inventions came out of the Industrial Revolution. Although most things were good that came out of the revolution, child labor was the one thing that reached a new extreme. Children had always been servants throughout most of history already. Children were now used in factories or mines because they were tiny enough to allow them to fit in the places that adults couldn’t.

At the beginning of the 1800’s most laborers worked at home. The family functioned together as a working unit for the common good of all its members. Children would stay at home to help until they got married. They usually did not become contributing members until they reached the age of ten. Girls started somewhat earlier because they would be assisting their mothers with the domestic economy(Gaskell, 91).

In the early twentieth century it was very common for minors to work extremely long hours in industrial practices. It was not for nothing though, many families’ income depended on that earned by their children. Because of this, the public concern about the results this kind of work produced for children began to increase tremendously. Although there were many people that were supporters of working minors, the advocates for child labor laws presented that minors who worked those sixty hour weeks were, in fact, not able to get a proper education and live a necessary childhood. The most important worry was the physical risk as children working in industries had large accident rates. As a result, some states passed laws restricting child labor,

The conditions that children were working in during the 19th century were not safe for a child who has not fully developed. In 1841 the most common occupations for boys was in agriculture with 196,640 children, serventry with 90,464 children and in cotton manufacturing with 44,833 children. The occupations were similar for girls in 1841 with cotton manufacturing with 62,131, servantry with 346,079 girls, and in dress making with 22,174 children ("Child Labor During The British Industrial Revolution"). These numbers were very surprising and they truly show just how many families were in a situation where they weren't financially able to care for their families. Not only were the numbers surprising but the conditions in which the children were