The women who followed their work into the factory were the least fortunate. It was only where the men had lost their footing in the economic struggle that the women offered their services outside of the home for a wage. They were the least efficient workers, and least able to protect themselves from a ruthless exploitation. The women who remained at home were the more fortunate in their matrimonial relations, for their husbands were still able to provide for their families, and the family social group was not disturbed. The women continued to can their fruit and to make their garments. The home was not less a home than under the old domestic system of industry but more a home, for the number and variety of wants had increased and the standard of living had been raised. Thus we see that the industrial evolution has had one of two effects upon the homes of the working class. It has forced thousands of women and children into the factories, many of whom make up the ranks of the “submerged tenth” or the population in a “slum” district. They were economically the weakest, hence were easy victims of a _laissez faire_ economic regime. Their homes spelled retrogression in the evolution of the race, for they constituted the most unfit type in the industrial evolution. Those who were not victims of the economic regime benefited, at least in some measure, by the decreased cost of production. The wives of the men who were able, either alone or through trade association, to hold their own in the economic struggle gradually ceased to be drudges. Every time the factory invaded the home to deprive it of one more of its industries, the wife either was forced to follow her work, or gained an increased amount of leisure to be applied in her home as she saw fit. Upon each encroachment of the factory upon the home there followed a weeding-out process and a few more women became wage earners. This process has gone on from decade to decade, and excepting in a few individual cases, women have been helpless in determining their fate. Excepting where they went to the factory they did not affect the economic situation of the time. They adapted themselves to circumstances as best they could, and had no other conception of the economic situation than that the money income of the family had increased or decreased. At only one period in their lives did they and their parents realize they had a voice in their economic destiny, and that was when they chose their life companions. They appreciated the importance of a competent bread-winner. For this reason man’s economic status has always been important in winning a bride. Indeed many sins of his past have been forgiven because he was able “to make her a good living.”