Throughout The Jungle, Jurgis and his extended family suffer numerous tribulations due to poverty, misfortune, difficulty with the law, alcoholism, illness, corruption, and abysmal working conditions. Jurgis and his family traveled from Lithuania to achieve the American dream. They were met with nothing but tragedy and heartache yet they believed that they would make it someday, they would be the American dream. In spite of the situation in which Jurgis resided, ultimately by the conclusion of the novel he found deliverance from destitution and despair through joining the Socialist party movement.
             When Jurgis went to work for Brown's killing beds, a slaughterhouse, he soon found out that not everything was done sanitarily and by the books. In one incident, a cow that was ready to calve was brought into the slaughterhouse to be butchered because the packers wanted to save time and cattle food. This was not acceptable according to government standards, but whenever it did happen an employee would go and tell the boss and the boss would then initiate a conversation and distract the government inspector. By the time the government inspector came back the cow would be cleaned out and the entrails, including the calve would have disappeared, someone was to slide all of the innards under the trap for later use. Depending on what task an employee performed at the slaughterhouse determined how hazardous it was for the employee to work. If one of the employees in the pickle rooms scrape their hand or finger pushing a truck they might end up with a sore that could put the worker out of work all the joints in his fingers or the skin on his hands might be eaten away at by the acid. On the other hand, the butchers, floors men, beef-boners, and trimmers would not have to worry about acid, they have to worry about sharp metal objects, such as a knife. It was rare to find someone, in one of the positions mentioned above, that has full use of ...