Women Wage-Earners: Their Past, Their Present, and Their Future

by Helen Campbell

PRESENT WAGE-RATES IN THE UNITED STATES.

Under this heading it is proposed to include, not only the trades just specified as coming under the investigations recorded in "Working-Women in Large Cities," but also such data as can be gleaned from all the labor reports which have given any attention to this phase of the labor question. Naturally, then, we turn to the report of the Massachusetts Bureau for 1881, the first statement of these points, and compare it with the results obtained in the last report from Washington, as well as with the returns from the various States where investigation of the question has been made.

Exceptionally favorable conditions would seem to belong to the year in which the report for 1884 appeared. The financial distress of 1877, with its results, had passed. New industries of many orders had opened up for women, and trade in all its forms called for workers and gave almost constant employ, save in the few occupations which have a distinct season, and oblige those engaged in them to divide their time between two if a living is assured.

A distinction must at once be made in the definition of earnings. In speaking of them, there are necessarily three designations,—wages, earnings, and income. Wages represent the actual pay per week at the time employed, with no reference to the number of weeks' employment during the year. Earnings are the total receipts for any year from wages. Thus, for example, a girl is paid $5 a week wages, and works forty weeks of her year. Her earnings would then be for the year $200, though her wages of $5 per week would indicate that she earned $260 a year; while in fact her average weekly earnings would be for the whole year $3.84. Income is her total receipts for the year from all sources: wages, extra work, help from friends or from investments; in fact, any receipts from which expenses can be paid.

In preparing the tables of these reports, the highest, the lowest, the average, and the general average were brought into a final comparison. Often but one wage is given, and it then becomes naturally both highest and lowest; but all figures are made to indicate an entire occupation or branch of industry, and not a few high or low paid employees in that branch. It is only with the final comparison that we are able to deal, the reader being referred to the reports themselves for the invaluable details given at full length and including many hundred pages.

The divisions of occupations are the same as those of the tenth census, and the tables are made on the same system. To determine the general conditions for the twenty thousand at work, it was necessary to have accurate detail as to one thousand; and, in fact, 1,032 were interviewed. Directly after the work in this direction had ended, and before the report was ready for publication, a general reduction of ten per cent in wages took place, and this must be kept in mind in dealing with the returns recorded. In this, recapitulation is given in full, and, as will be seen, includes all occupations open to women.

RECAPITULATION

	BOSTON.		OTHER PARTS OF MASS.		OTHER STATES.
	Number.	Average weekly earnings.	Number.	Average weekly earnings.	Number.	Average weekly earnings.
Government and professional	7	$5 57	5	$6 40	10	$6 28
Domestic and personal office	178	5 94	27	5 33	21	4 69
Trade and transportation	221	5 00	4	9 25	4	7 25
Manufactures and mechanical industries	1,293	6 22	72	7 06	49	7 58
All occupations	1,699	$6 03	108	$6 68	84	$6 69

The commissioners of the New York State Bureau of Labor followed a slightly different method. The returns are no less minute, but are given under the heading of each trade, two hundred and forty-seven of which were investigated. The wages of workwomen for the entire year run from $3.50 to $4 a week, the general average not being given, though later returns make it $5.85. This is, however, for skilled labor; and as a vast proportion of women workers in New York City are engaged in sewing, the poorest paid of all industries, we must accept the first figures as nearer the truth. An expert on shirts receives as high as $12 a week, in some cases $15; but in slop work, and under the sweating-system, wages fall to $2.50 or $3 per week, and at times less. Mr. Peck found cloakmakers working on the most expensive and perfectly finished garments for 40 cents a day, a full day's pay being from 50 to 60 cents.[23] In other cases a day's work brought in but 25 cents, and seventeen overalls of blue denim gave a return of 75 cents. Two and a half cents each is paid for the making of boys' gingham waists, with trimming on neck and sleeves, including the button-holes; and the women who made these sat sixteen hours at the sewing-machine, with a result of 25 cents.[24]

This was for irregular work. Women employed on clothing in general, working for reputable firms, receive from $4.50 to $6 per week. In the tobacco manufacture, in which great numbers are employed, $9 is the lowest actual earnings, and $20 the highest per week. In cigarettes, the pay ranges from $4 to $15 per week. In dry-goods, with ten divisions of employment,—cashiers, bundle-girls, saleswomen, floor-walkers, seamstresses, cloakmakers, cash-girls, stock-girls, milliners, and sewing-girls,—the lowest sum per week is $1.50, paid to cash-girls, and the highest paid to floor-walkers, $16. On the east side of the city, shop girls receive often as low as $3 per week; in a few cases specified, $2.50 per week.[25]

In laundry-work, which includes several divisions, wages weekly range from $7.50 to $10, though ironers of special excellence sometimes make from $12 to $15 per week. In millinery the wages are from $6 to $7 per week. In preserving and fruit-canning wages are from $3.50 to $10, the average worker earning about $5 per week. Mr. Peck states that in fashion trades the two distinct seasons bring the year's earnings to about six months. "Learners" in the trades coming under this head receive $1.50 per week. Saleswomen suffer also from season trade, as it necessitates reduction of force. The better class of workers receive from $8 to $15 per week, while heads of departments range from $25 to $50, or even higher, for exceptional merit. These cases are of the rarest, however, the wage as an average falling below that of Boston.

But three State reports cover the same dates as these already quoted (1885 and 1886),—Connecticut, New Jersey, and California, the former being for 1885. In this, women's wages are given incidentally in general tables, and must be disentangled to find any average. In artificial flowers the highest wage is given as $7, and the lowest $3, the average being $5. In blankets and woollen goods the highest is $12.50 and the lowest $6, an average of $9 per week. In factory work of all orders, wages range from $6 to $9.75 per week, the average paid to women and girls being $7.50 per week. In clothing, including underwear, wages are from $3 to $15 per week, and the average annual income of women in these trades is given as $300 per year. In cloakmaking the lowest wage is $3, the highest $9, and the average $7.50. The average wage for San Francisco is given as $6.95, and that for the whole State is about $6. The Connecticut report for 1885 gives simply the yearly wage in various trades. Reason for this is found in the fact that it was the first, and could thus deal with the subject only tentatively. Clothing is given as producing for women a yearly average of $229, and shirts $237. Factory work gave $207, paper boxes $227, and woollen goods $245.

In the report for 1886, the lowest average wage is reported as found in the making of wearing apparel; but the average for the State was found to be a trifle over $6.50 per week.

The report from New Jersey makes the lowest wages $3 per week, and the highest $10, the average being $5. This report covers ground more fully and in more varied directions than any one of the same period, though there is only incidental reference to the work of women as a whole, the returns being given in the general tables of wages. Wages and the cost of living are compared, and the chapter under this head is one of the most valuable in the summary of reports as a whole. The report for 1886 gives the same general average of wages for the State, but adds an exhaustive treatment of "Earnings, Cost of Living, and Prices."

Maine sent out its first annual report in 1887, and gives the wages of women workers as $3.58 for the lowest, and $15.20 for the highest, the annual earnings ranging from $104 to $520. The report from the same State for 1889 takes up the subject of working-women in detail, giving their home or boarding conditions, sanitary conditions, their own remarks on trades, wages, etc., and the aspect of their labor as a whole. The average wage remains the same.

Rhode Island, in its Third Annual Report for 1889, under the direction of Commissioner Almon K. Goodwin, gives the average wage for the State as $5.87, and devotes the bulk of its space to working-women, with full returns from the entire State.

For the same year California, by its labor commissioner, Mr. John J. Tobin, gives an equally exhaustive statement of the conditions of women wage-earners in that State. The lowest weekly wage given is $5, and the highest $11. Plain cooks receive from $25 to $40 a month with board and lodging, and domestic servants from $15 to $25 with board. In cloak-making the lowest wage is $3, and the highest $7.50; and in shirt-making the lowest is $2.50, and the highest $6. General clothing and underwear range from $4.50 to $6, and other trades average a trifle higher wage than in New England. The chapter on domestic service is suggestive and important, and the whole treatment makes the report a necessity to all who would understand the situation in detail. This, however, is so true of all that have touched upon the subject that it appears invidious to single out any one alone. They must be taken together. With each year the scientific value of each increases, and there appears to be distinct emulation among the commissioners as to which shall embody the most in the returns made and the general treatment of the whole.

The first report from Colorado, issued in 1888, Mr. James Rice commissioner, devotes a chapter to women wage-earners, with an additional one on domestic service and its drawbacks. The average wage for the State is given as $6; and the commissioner states that notwithstanding the general impression that higher wages are paid in Colorado than at any other point save California, actual returns show that the average sums in several occupations are less than that paid to persons similarly employed in cities along the Atlantic seaboard.

Kansas, in its fifth annual report issued in 1889, gives a section to working-women. The commissioner, Mr. Frank Betton, considers the returns imperfect, great difficulty having been experienced in securing them. The average weekly wage is given as $5.17. Expenses are carefully analyzed, and there is a report of the remarks of employers, as well as from a number of those employed.

In the report from Iowa for 1887, Commissioner Hutchins laments that so few women have been willing to fill out blanks of returns. The wage returns given range from $3.75 to $9. The report for 1889 makes mention of continued difficulties in securing returns, and gives the annual earnings of women as from $100 to $440. The tables include cost of living and many other essential particulars.

Wisconsin, in the report for 1884, has a chapter on working-girls. It gives the average weekly income in personal services as $5.25; in trade, $4.18; in manufactures, $5.22, and the general average for the year as $5.17.

Minnesota, whose first report, under the supervision of Commissioner John Lamb, appeared in 1888 for the years 1887 and 1888, found little or no room for statistics, but included a chapter on working-women, with a few admirable tables of age, nativity, home and working conditions, etc. Minute inquiry was made as to cost of living, clothing, etc.; and the results form a chapter of painful interest, that on domestic service being equally suggestive. Clothing, as usual, represents the lowest average wage, $3.66 per week, the highest being $8.50, and the general average a trifle over $6.

Michigan, in 1890, under its labor commissioner, Mr. Henry A. Robinson, added to the list one of the most thorough studies yet made of general conditions. The agents of the bureau, trained for the work, made personal visits to working-women and girls to the number of 13,436, this representing one hundred and thirty-seven distinct industries and three hundred and seventy-eight occupations. The blanks prepared for filling out contained one hundred and twenty-nine questions, classified as follows: Social, 28; industrial, 12; hours of labor, 14; economic, 54; sanitary, 21, with seven others as to dress, societies, church attendance, with remarks and suggestions from the workers themselves. As usual, in such cases, employers here and there objected to any investigation, fearing labor organizations were at the bottom of it; but the majority allowed free examination. The report is very full, and gives a clear and full view of the individual lives of this body of women workers. The average wage proved to be $4.81 per week, the average income for the year being $216.45. The average income of teachers and those in public positions was $457.27.

This is the showing, State by State, so far as bureaus have reported. Many States have made no move in this direction; but interest is now thoroughly aroused, and the subject is likely to find treatment in all, this depending somewhat, however, on the character of the State industries and the numbers at work in each. Manufacturing necessarily brings with it conditions that in the end compel inquiry; and for most of the Southern States such industries are still new, while the West has not yet found the same occasion as the East for full knowledge of the problems involved in woman's work and wages.

We come now to the most elaborate and far-reaching inquiry yet made,—the work of the United States Bureau of Labor under Commissioner Wright, entitled "Working-Women in Large Cities." Twenty-two of these are reported upon after one of the most rigorous examinations ever undertaken; and the average wage of each tallies with the rates given in the States to which they belong. Taken alphabetically, the list is as follows:—