having to work without rest for longer hours. The
capitalists were more concerned with the welfare of machines than with the
working hands since the machines represented a huge investment of money,
whereas the workers did not. At the same time, the wages paid to them were
also very less. Working class who were wholly dependent on employers,
workers had to accept what ever wage the employer offered, since there were
usually more workers than jobs available. This was because the number of
workers available was much higher than the costs necessary to buy the
labor. Since women and children were available to tend the machines, and
since they were paid much less wages than paid to men, the owners preferred
to employ women and children, and men had to sit idle at home. Women and
children were employed even in mines, they were hired for less money and
the work was 15 to 18 hours a day, which was to work with no rest periods,
and workers who fell asleep on duty, were beaten by the supervisors.
If we take a look at the records of the child labor in those days we
could understand that those were the days, which witnessed the greatest
horrors of industrialism. Dirty surroundings were the horrible condition of
child labors in a factory. Children were about 8 or 10 to 15 of age, and
worked from 5 O' clock in the morning till 8 at night which meant a work of
15 hours a day When the regular hours of the work were stopped for the
repair or mill or any want of raw materials, children made up for the loss
of that inventory receiving or repair time afterward. And standing for the
whole of their time they did the work and mill-floors was their bed after
the work time. Children were also injured by the machinery frequently and
were beaten severely if they fell asleep. They were employed to pull carts
loaded with coal through th...