Child Labor During The Industrial Revolution Essay

During the late 18th through the19th century, the industrial revolution created many changes in regards to labor. Many people of the working class were affected positively in the way of new jobs, better quality products, and quality of life (Doc3, Doc4, Doc 5). While others lost family or experienced a decrease in the quality of life (Doc1, Doc2, Doc7). Some workers soon became dependent on technological machinery (Doc 6, Doc 8, Doc 9). Many workers lives during The Industrial Revolution were changed for the positive as many people such as children had a chance to enrich their lives because they were given a purpose (Doc 3).

The Industrial Revolution brought about significant changes to the workplace. In Document 1, Thomas Bernhard describes the working conditions of children employed in Mr. Dale's cotton mills. While children in other factories faced harsh working conditions, Mr. Dale's factory had special regulations to protect the health and morals of those under his protection. Out of nearly 3,000 children employed in the mills from 1785 to 1797, only fourteen have died, and not one has been the object of judicial punishment.

Child Labor in the Early 1900's There was a time in America when it was common for children to be working intense amounts in the factories of the labor industry. By 1904, 50,000 workers in the South were under the age of 16 with 20,000 under the age of 12. Having children working in the industry was dangerous and unreasonable and resulted in countless accidents in the workspace. In the early 1900's, children who worked in the labor industry were exploited as they were forced to work long hours, were deprived of an education, and ultimately put their lives at risk until The National Child Labor Committee began advocating for reform.

During the “Cottage Industry”, children often worked on their parent’s farm or in a family business. However, once all factories were built in, children were encouraged to join the workforce in the cities. The unfortunate truth was that children were a lot easier to take advantage of. In other words, they would be mistreated, paid a lot less, and work in unsafe environments.

According to NPR, “About half worked on family farms. The rest did everything else, working in factories, trained as apprentices, and served as messengers”. Also working non stop for long hours made children prone to physical and mental disorders. Working had affected children's health, education, and their childhood. Children didn’t have a childhood, they basically skipped their childhood and went right to work instead.

George Norton, in his essay on Highlighting the Injustice and Brutality Suffered by Child Chimney Sweeps in the late 18th and 19th centuries states, “not only are the sweeps innocent victims of the cruellest exploration but they are associated with the smoke of industrialization, thus uniting two central Romantic preoccpations: childhood; and the impact of the Industrial Revolution on the natural world.” The social factors of the Romantic era were heavily influenced by the industrialization. Everyone was a victim of this change but those lower on the social hierarchy were affected most. For this, children were sold and had to labour; child labour.

Unsafe working conditions plagued next to, if not, all factories during industrialization. Thousands of workers grew ill or suffered injuries as a consequence of their labor, and would yield their jobs, surrendering their source of income. Taken in the early 1900s, “Lewis Hine’s picture depicts two children working on a very dangerous machine” (Document 8). The matter that children were allowed to manage these machines is awful enough, ignoring just how dangerous the machines were. In addition to this, the children did not appear to be well supervised, which made it all too easy for a disastrous injury to occur.

The Industrial Revolution was a horrific time in the 1700s by the fact that it caused bad pollution and children would be worn out at the end of their work day. The greatest aspect of industrialization was that the kids and adults had good surroundings. “Of these there are 500 children who are entirely fed, clothed, and educated by Mr.Dale” (Document 6). The quote is evidence that shows the kids were well cared for.

Child labor during the 18th and 19th century did not only rapidly develop an industrial revolution, but it also created a situation of difficulty and abuse by depriving children of edjucation, good physical health, and the proper emotional wellness and stability. In the late 1700 's and early 1800 's, power-driven machines replaced hand labor for making most manufactured items. Many of America 's factories needed a numerous amount of workers for a cheap salary. Because of this, the amount of child laborers have been growing rapidly over the early 1800s.

Many admitted to being beaten when they were late as children, having only an hour off at noon to eat, and children had to work in the poor and often dangerous conditions. In the same interviews presented to Parliament, a worker reported working from six in the morning until eight at night, an average of fourteen hours per day for mere cents, and that was during the ‘normal’ production months. Long hours, low wages, and child labor were nothing new to the poor, but the conditions still took a toll on families. Hours and hours went into work, which left little time for a family to spend time with one another, and children not able to learn skills from their parents once the industrialization of the common world came into play, not only in Britain but also on a worldwide scale.

The term "child labor" has become associated with the use of children in organized employment settings in fields such as the trades, manufacturing, agriculture, or domestic work. In most cases, children who work for paid employment do so out of economic necessity. Child labor was commonplace in the household, and children were routinely sent away to serve as apprentices and domestic labor for wages at ages as young as eight or nine in many cultures. Modern objections to child labor began within a few decades after the Industrial Revolution took hold in Great Britain. Critics of child labor in the nineteenth century charged that children took jobs from men, who needed the wages to support their families.

Conditions were even worse for children. Children were expected to work 16 hours a day, walk 2 hours each day back home and only have an hour break each day. According to Michael Sadler; he reported several testimonies, some of which talk about how kids were beaten, overworked and lacked food/water. One child testified that toward the end of the day, “when they cannot keep up with it very well, and the consequences are that they are beaten to spur them on” (Perry 131).

Skilled and unskilled workers alike were paid subsistence-level wages. If the work were seasonal or demand slumped, when they were laid off, they had no savings to live on until the next job opportunity could be found. Poor Victorians would put children to work at an early age, or even turn them out onto the streets to fend for themselves. In 1848 an estimated 30,000 homeless, filthy children lived on the streets” (Poverty in Victorian

Child Labour was not an establishment formed from The Industrial Revolution, but rather industrialization that expanded the demand for labour. Oxfords’ Professor Jane Humphries says that estimated by early 19th century England had more than 1 million child workers, 350,00 were 7 to 10 year olds and made up 15% of the total labour force. Each have experienced such traumatic involvement and hardships. Charles Aberdeen shared his experience when he worked in the Manchester Cotton Factory in 1882.

Truth is what they did to those children was cruel. When the industrial revolution started a new way of social division developed in which individuals were members of a socially determined class, meaning the class in which you were born. The educated public people saw themselves as the backbone of the middle class and the people saw themselves as the