Socialism; Women -- Social and moral questions; Women and socialism
Wages are lowest in the domestic industries for both men and women,
but especially for women, and the hours of work are unlimited. Also
domestic industry frequently implies the so-called sweating system.
A sub-contractor distributes the work among the workers and receives
for his remuneration a considerable amount of the wages paid by the
employer. How wretchedly female labor is paid in these sweated trades,
may be seen from the following reports on conditions in Berlin.
For men’s colored shirts, manufacturers paid from 2 to 2½ marks in
1889. In 1893 they obtained them for 1.20 mark. A seamstress of
medium ability must toil from dawn to darkness to finish from 6 to
8 shirts daily; her weekly wages amounts to from 4 to 5 marks. An
apronmaker earns 2½ to 5 marks weekly, a tiemaker 5 to 6 marks,
a ~skillful~ shirt-waist maker 6 marks, a ~very skilled~ worker
on boys’ suits 8 to 9 marks, a worker on coats 5 to 6 marks. An
experienced seamstress on fine men’s shirts can earn 12 marks per
week if the season is good, and if she works from 5 o’clock in the
morning until 10 o’clock at night. Milliners who can copy models
independently earn 30 marks ~monthly~; experienced trimmers who have
been working at their trade for years earn 50 to 60 marks per month
during the season. The season lasts five months. An umbrellamaker
earns 6 to 7 marks weekly with a twelve-hour day. Such starvation
wages drive working girls to prostitution, for even with the most
modest requirements no working girl can live in Berlin for less than
9 to 10 marks per week.
All these facts show that the modern development of industry draws
away women more and more from the family and the home. Marriage and
the family are being disrupted, and so from the standpoint of these
facts also it becomes absurd to relegate woman to the home and the
family. Only they can resort to this argument who go through life
blindly and fail to see the trend of development, or do not wish to
see it. In many branches of industry, women are employed exclusively;
in a great many they constitute the majority of workers, and in
most of the remaining branches women find more or less employment.
The number of working women is steadily growing and new lines of
activity are constantly being opened to them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account