Economy and Labor ( ) AP U.S. HISTORY 6.1 (II)

Laissez-faire Policies and Competition  Laissez-faire  No government intervention in the economy  No regulations (Hands off)  The market will govern itself  Extreme Capitalism  Many felt this policy promoted long term economic development  Even in times of recession government should be hands off

Expansion of the Labor Force  Domestic Migration  Rural to urban  International Immigration  25 Million between 1865 & 1915  Eastern Industrial Cities  1870s & 1880s  England, Ireland, and Northern Europe  By the end of the 1800s (New Immigration  Southern and Eastern Europe  Italy, Greece, Poland  The West  Dominated by Mexican and Asian (Chinese) immigration

What Was Driving International Immigration  Push Factors  Escaping poverty and oppression  Pull Factors  Economic opportunities  Recruitment of international laborers  Employers would actively encourage migration to industrial cities and western lands  Newspaper advertisements  Ex. Railroad recruitment of “settlers”

Increasing Ethnic Tensions  Immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe  Displaced the old immigrants (English and Irish) from industrial jobs  Displaced Northern European workers in eastern mines  Willing to accept lower wages  Immigrants from Mexico and China competed for jobs in the west

Child Labor On the Rise  By 1900  1.7 million children under the age of 16 were employed in factories and fields  Why?  Families needed the additional income  A way to keep mothers/wives at home  Reformers take notice  Public outraged leads to the passage of child labor laws  Limited impact  Laws were ignored and did not impact child labor in agriculture

Labor vs. Management  Transition from artisan to industrial production  Battled over wages and conditions  Most wages did not provide a level of comfort  Low job security  Boom/bust cycles of the economy  Technology  Seasonality  Poverty was always just a step away

Labor vs. Management  Working conditions  hours a day 6 days a week  Unsafe and unhealthy factories  Accidents were frequent and severe  Losing limbs, death  Loss of control of labor  Modern corporation = labors lost control of their own labor  Subjected to total control of managers  Factory efficiency > condition of laborers

Labor vs. Management  Growth of Labor Unions  Labor unions existed before the Civil War, but were small craft unions  The National Labor Union (1866)  William H. Sylvis  First attempt at uniting separate unions into one  640,000 members (no women or children)  Molly Maguires  Militant labor group

Labor Strikes & Unions  The Great Railroad Strike of 1877  10% cut in wages  Disrupted trans. from St. Louis to Baltimore  100+ die in the weeks following  The Knights of Labor (1869)  First national labor organization  Loosely organized  One union for all  Welcomed women  Wage system vs. cooperative system

Labor Strikes & Unions  The American Federation of Labor  Association of various smaller craft unions  Better wages & conditions  Embraced the ideas of Capitalism  Desired a bigger slice of the pie for workers  Generally hostile to women joining  Women only drove down pay b/c they are weak  Supported higher pay for women  8 Hour work day

Labor Strikes  May 1, 1886  AFL calls for a general strike  May 4, 1886  Haymarket Square  Strike at McCormick Harvester Company in Chicago  Middle-class America shocked  Anarchy becomes synonymous with labor unions  Weakens the labor movement

Labor Strikes  The Homestead Strike  Steel strike at one of Carnegie’s mills in Pittsburgh  Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers  Labor union weakened  The Pullman Strikes