The Pros And Cons Of Victorian Child Labor

Children would start work in coal mines and factories as young as 5 years old to 18 years of age. A child would work 18 hour days. Work days typically ran from early morning to late at night, and winter usually made longer hours, from 68 to 72 hours per week. Because of laissez faire businesses were allowed to pay an extremely low amount of money and to allow children to work in horrible working conditions. This is why children were often forced into labor, it also was to help their families bring in more

Child laborers often work for long hours and little paid due to the fact that they are easy to either manage or control by adults. They had to work in factories with poor conditions and especially dangerous for children. Due to these historical examples, moral obligation of a society may not fail to

It was not unusual that death rates went up for the working class, due to all the hazards. Labor unions thought that having hazardous working conditions was unfair, and for what? “Women filling the

Children as young as six years old during the industrial revolution worked hard hours for little or no pay. Children sometimes worked up to 19 hours a day, with a one-hour total break. This was a little bit on the extreme, but it was not common for children who worked in factories to work 12-14 hours with the same minimal breaks. Not only were these children subject to long hours, but also, they were in horrible conditions. There’s large, heavy, and dangerous equipment was very common for children to be using or working near.

Child labour has been happening since the beginning of the industrial revolution when factories were first introduced. The working conditions unfitting for children with large and dangerous machinery, long work days and very little break time. It is said that child labour was crucial during the Industrial Revolution for it to succeed. By the early 1800s, England had employed over a million child workers. " Factory owners were looking for cheap, malleable and fast-learning work forces – and found them ready-made among the children of the urban workhouses," states Professor Jane Humphries from Oxford.

Children were also beaten in the event that they weren't

Occasionally, a child would get the job of tattooing new arrivals at the camp or throwing the gassed bodies into the crematorium. The lives of the Aryan children were affected too. German children were recruited for Hitler’s Youth. At first, it was mainly boys and optional, but by the end of the war, both boys and girls of age ten were required to join.

A very important of example of what the life was like in industrialization within the Gilded Age was the Cotton Mills Girls… “I was eleven years old when I went to work in the mill. They learnt me to knit. Well, I was so little that they had to build me a box to get up

During mid 19th century, coal mining dominated North Eastern Pennsylvania, a state with great potential of anthracite coal. In 1870s, very powerful individuals controlled the coal fields and railroads. These individuals monopolized the coal industry recruiting immigrants to work for fewer wage than the American employees, luring them with promises of fortune. Hundreds of immigrants, transported by trains, replaced the local minors who were forced one by one to pave way for immigrants, either abandoning or re-treating the industry.

 Due to this increasing need, a massive bump up in child labour was created.  This created yet another problem that the people of the Victorian Age had to unfortunately deal with.   They often did jobs that required small hands or people to fit into small places, like cleaning chimneys, unclogging garment machines or sweeping floors in factories including under gigantic machines (Cunnington).  

This is one of the many photographs Lewis Hine took for the National Child Labor Committee. In 1906 Lewis Hine was hired to document the conditions in which children were forced to work under. His photos would be published for the public to see. This photo shows young boys, ages 4-16 years old, in torn and tattered clothes, dirty from working a full day’s work. These children only made pennies a day and worked under harsh and dangerous conditions.

After arriving in Pennsylvania George Karacha starts to work at the railroad along with his brother in law and his best friend Joe. His job on the railroad was very demanding. With low wages and long working hours it was barely enough to support his growing family. After working for a railroad, George follows Andrej and changes his occupation to steel mill. First, he moved to moved first to Bear creek and later to Plymouth.

There were a lot of children in one family, so money was an issue which was why most children worked. They were at home or at the factories they didn’t go

Children in third world countries need the money from their jobs in the factory. “In other cultures, children are expected to work together with their parents. This happens not only with financial need, but also as part of the family’s work ethics” (Page 9, paragraph 49). Their version of childhood is different than how some of us may see it. They are used to working

Tuttle,Carolyn. Edited: Robert Whaples “ Child labor during the British industrial revolution.” .EH.Net Encyclopedia. August 14, 2001.