Second Industrial Revolution
Katelyn Rye
Work Life of the poor
The work life for many lower class citizens in the 2nd Industrial Revolution was a very difficult way of living . Due to the concept of laissez-faire,which is a policy of letting things take it's own course. So many corporations would give their workers low wages such as only 3 dollars a week. Also having to work a exhausting amount of hours. The conditions of the working environment was filthy with many dangerous machinery.Many people lost limbs and sometimes even killed.
Work life of the rich
Well-known people during the 1800 s was John.D Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie. They both created monopolies in the oil and steel industries. Monopolies are when a company has complete control over a certain supply or service. Letting them make a huge amount of money due to no other competition. So having a idea and creating factories, giving low wages to the poor gave people such as John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie a easy way of living. As you can see from the picture, John D. Rockefeller is nicely dressed without holes and not covered in filth like a poor person would be dressed because of his wealth.
Housing of the poor and rich
Many of the lower class lived in the cities because it was a way to find work in factories. But having such a low income lead them to worn down places,such as tenements. Tenements are crowded buildings that were very dangerous. Many were only one room for multiple people to live in. Leading to many household fires that would spread throughout other tenements. One event is the Chicago fire of 1872. It killed 300 people and left 18,000 homeless. The housing for the rich would have many rooms and many luxuries compared to lower class citizens. For example Andrew Carnegie had central heating and 4 levels with 64 rooms,creating a mansion.
The life of a poor child and a rich child
Many children even at the age of 6 had to work. Children worked with dangerous machinery that could easily injure them or even killed them. They were not properly dressed either,many wore no shoes as they worked on equipment.If a child were to make a mistake the child was punished violently. The children had no time to go to school because of how many hours of work to do. A lot of children had to work due to a loss of parents or just because of such a low income the family was getting.A child of a higher class was able to go to school. Many children went to school,but girls did not for higher academics due to not having many rights.
Leisure activities for rich and poor
The rich enjoyed going to horse races and baseball games. Also playing sports themselves. Many women liked to read fashion magazines to follow the latest trends. Couples liked to go to dances, and many enjoyed going to church gatherings. The poor made up their own games such as kick the can.The picture shows some of the fashion trends men and women liked.They liked to dress in very nice suits and big dresses.