THE FORMATION OF THE AMERICAN WORKFORCE.
The 1870-1900's was a very significant period of time in our countries history. The effects of this time period has had some of the biggest and most important impacts in history by helping form our entire system of Employment and Industrial regulations. However, before these reforms and regulations could be put into effect there were several groups of people whose hard work and suffering paved the way. A few examples of these groups are immigrants, women, and children. .
This time period is known for being a time of great advances in technology. Such as, Thomas Edison's telegraph and Alexander Graham Bell's telephone, but more importantly was the advancements made in technology, which caused the development of the large industrial corporations. The increase in technology meant an increase in production of various goods or products, and this meant that more workers would be needed to meet this demand. This is where the role of the immigrant came into play.
This explosion in the workforce caused industries to become very greedy and competitive. Therefore, the industries at this time only cared about money (capital) and not it's employees, who were considered relevant or dispensable. This attitude toward employees had a dramatic effect on the kind of workers in demand. Normally, highly skilled, white males were the kind of employee factories of industries found suitable for employment, but with the masses of immigrants entering the United States at this time they soon became the favorable employee. Naturally industries concerned only with making money preferred to employee the unskilled and uneducated immigrant at a dramatically lower rate of pay. The immigrant worker was also preferred because not only did they work for cheaper wages, but also the employer usually provided them with a place to live and perhaps a loan. This system was extremely beneficial to the industry leaders because they received most of the immigrant workers wages back in rent or loan payments.
