The Gilded Age: Unions and the Labor Movement

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Evan Anton Professor Andrea Estepa Rough Draft The Gilded Age and the Labor Movement The Gilded Age took place during the last thirty years of the nineteenth century where unionization of workers would become more frequent. The reasoning behind the name of this era is due to the fact that everything seemed nice on the outside in America but in actuality corruption and inequality could be found underneath the surface. As the economy was changing during the industrial revolution workers began leaving rural areas and flooding to urban areas for the opportunities, such as working for the oil or steel industry. The development of steam engine railroads for transportation and increased development of factory manufacturing techniques, caused more A fire that was said to be caused from an unextinguished match or cigarette, set ablaze this highly flammable work environment. This tragedy brought attention to the unregulated/unsafe working conditions that the women who had lost their lives were experiencing. In response, the Ladies Waist-makers Union formed one of the world’s largest female strikes. This is an example of a successful strike that was effective in achieving higher wages and improved working conditions. This strike marked the significance of women workers organizing and achieving bargaining Pullman Palace Car Company made luxury railroad cars. The people who lived in the town of Pullman payed rent by deductions from their wages. The owner of the town and company George Pullman had workers’ wages get cut in addition to workers getting leadoff. Many people who worked for the company whose wages got cut had trouble affording the standard living costs in Pullman and were given “starvation wages.” The organization of the pissed off workers followed. The workers would go on a nationwide strike organized by the American Railway Union and was led by a man named Eugene debs. Eugene and his union was so powerful because they possessed the ability to paralyze the production of the railroad industry. George Pullman tried to hire people to break up the strike but ends up being unsuccessful. Federal troops were sent in and the court rules that workers must return back to work and the strike is ended. A more successful collective bargaining union was known as the American Federation of Labor (AFL) founded by Samuel Gompers in 1886. This organization focused on practical issues that involved craft unionization of skilled workers. The craft workers were successful in organizing because unlike the unskilled workers they could not be replaced easily. This union bargained for thing such as 8 hour work days, higher wages did not deal with social reforms. Women’s wages were not considered because the AFL dealt

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