Domestic service

by Lucy Maynard Salmon

PREFACE

The basis of the following discussion of the subject of domestic service is the information obtained through a series of blanks sent out during the years 1889 and 1890. Three schedules were prepared—one for employers, one for employees, and one asking for miscellaneous information in regard to the Woman’s Exchange, the teaching of household employments, and kindred subjects.[1] These schedules were submitted for criticism to several gentlemen prominent in statistical investigation, and after revision five thousand sets were distributed. These were sent out in packages containing from five to twenty-five sets through the members of the Classes of 1888 and 1889, Vassar College, and single sets were mailed, with a statement of the object of the work, to the members of different associations presumably interested in such investigations. These were the American Statistical Association, the American Economic Association, the Association of Collegiate Alumnæ, the Vassar Alumnæ, and the women graduates of the University of Michigan. They were also sent to various women’s clubs, and many were distributed at the request of persons interested in the work.

Of the five thousand sets of blanks thus sent out, 1025 were returned filled out by employers, twenty being received after the tabulation was completed. These gave the facts asked for with reference to 2545 employees. The returns received from employers thus bore about the same proportion to the blanks distributed as do the returns received in ordinary statistical investigation carried on without the aid of special agents or legal authority. The reasons why a larger number were not returned are the same as are found in all such inquiries, with a few peculiar to the nature of the case. The occupation investigated is one that does not bring either employer or employee into immediate contact with others in the same occupation, and it is therefore believed that the relations between employer and employee are purely personal, and thus not a proper subject for statistical inquiry. Another reason assigned was the fear that the agitation of the subject would cause employees to become dissatisfied, while a third reason was the large number of questions included in the blanks, and the fact that no immediate and possibly no remote benefit would accrue to those filling them out. Another reason frequently assigned was that all of the questions could not be answered, and that, therefore, replies to others could not be of service. Several of the questions, however, were framed with the understanding that in many cases they could not be definitely answered; as the question, “How many servants have you employed since you have been housekeeping?” The fact that often no reply could be given, was as significant of the condition of the service as a detailed statement could have been.

No success had been anticipated in securing replies from employees; but as any study of domestic service would be incomplete without looking at it from this point of view, the attempt was made. As a result, 719 blanks were returned filled out. In some instances employees, hearing of the inquiry, wrote for schedules and returned them answered. In a few cases correspondence was carried on with women who had formerly been in domestic service. The influences that operated to prevent employers from answering the inquiries made had even greater force in the case of employees. In addition, there was present a hesitation to commit anything to writing, or to sign a name to a document the import of which was not clearly understood by them.

The limited amount of information that could be given explains the small number of returns received to the third schedule,—about two hundred.

The returns received were sent to the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor, where, by the courtesy of the chief of the bureau, they were collated during the spring and summer of 1890, under the special direction of the chief clerk, in accordance with a previously arranged scheme of tables. The general plan of arrangement adopted was to class the schedules with reference to employers, first alphabetically by states and towns, and second alphabetically by population. The schedules were then classed with reference to employees, first by men and women, and second by place of birth. The various statistical devices used in the Massachusetts Bureau were employed in tabulating the material, and greatly facilitated the work.

Fifty large tables were thus prepared, and by various combinations numerous smaller ones were made. The classification thus adopted made it possible to give all the results either in a general form or with special reference to men and women employees, the native born and the foreign born, and to all of the branches of the service. It was also possible to study the conditions of the service geographically, and with reference to the population and to other industrial situations.

The most detailed tables made out concerned the wage question, including a presentation of classified wages, average wages with the percentage of employees receiving the same wages as the average, and also more or less than the average, a comparison of wages paid at different times and of wages received in domestic service and in other employments. For the purposes of comparison, the writer also classified the salaries paid to about six thousand teachers in the public schools in sixteen representative cities, as indicated by the reports of city superintendents for the year during which information concerning domestic service had been given on the schedules. Through the courtesy of a large employment bureau in Boston, the wages received by nearly three thousand employees were ascertained and used for comparison. The most valuable results of the investigation possibly were those growing out of the consensus of opinion obtained from employers and employees regarding the nature of the service considered as an occupation. The greater proportion of these tables can be found in Chapter V.

The question must naturally arise as to how far the returns received through such investigation can be considered representative. It has seemed to the writer that they could be considered fairly so. Investigations of this character must always be considered typical rather than comprehensive. It is difficult to fix the exact number to be considered typical as between a partial investigation and a census which is exhaustive. In some cases it is possible to obtain a majority in numbers, in others it is not. If the number of returns, however, passes the point where it would be considered trivial, the number between this and the majority may perhaps be regarded as representative. By the application of a similar principle, the expression at the polls of the wishes of the twentieth part of the inhabitants of a state is recognized as the will of the majority. But, while the returns can be considered only fairly representative as regards numbers, they seem entirely so as regards conditions. It is believed that every possible condition under which domestic service exists, as regards both employer and employee, is represented by the returns received, and that, therefore, the conclusions drawn from these results cannot be wholly unreasonable. Moreover, the circulars were sent out practically at random, and, therefore, do not represent any particular class in society, except the class sufficiently interested in the subject to answer the questions asked. If the returns thus secured can be regarded in any sense as representative, the results based on them may be considered as indicating certain general conditions and tendencies, although the conclusions reached may be modified by later and fuller researches.

The question must also arise as to what it is hoped will be accomplished through this investigation. It is not expected that all, or even any one of the perplexing questions connected with domestic service will be even partially answered by it; it is not expected that any individual housekeeper will have less trouble to-morrow than to-day in adjusting the difficulties arising in her household; it will not enable any employer whose incompetent cook leaves to-day without warning to secure an efficient one without delay. It is hoped, however, that the tabulation and presentation of the facts will afford a broader basis for general discussion that has been possible without them, that a knowledge of the conditions of domestic service beyond their own localities and households will enable some housekeepers in time to decide more easily the economic questions arising within every home, that it will do a little something to stimulate discussion of the subject on other bases than the purely personal one. The hope has also come that writers on economic theory and economic conditions will recognize the place of domestic service among other industries, and will give to the public the results of their scientific investigations of the subject, that the great bureaus of labor—always ready to anticipate any demand of the public—will recognize a demand for facts in this field of work.

The writer has followed the presentation of facts by a theoretical discussion of doubtful and possible remedies. But if fuller and more searching official investigation, establishing a substantial basis for discussion, should point to conclusions entirely at variance with those here given, no one would more heartily rejoice than herself. It may reasonably be said that in view of the character of the investigation no conclusions at all should have been advanced by the investigator. Three things, however, seemed to justify the intrusion of personal views; a recognition of the prevalent anxiety to find a way out of existing difficulties, a belief that improvement can come only as each one is willing to make some contribution to the general discussion, and a conviction that no one should criticise existing conditions unless prepared to suggest others that may be substituted for them.

The following discussion would have been impossible without the hearty co-operation of the thousand and more employers and the seven hundred employees who filled out the schedules distributed. The great majority of these were personally unknown to the writer, and she can express only in this public way her deep appreciation of their kindness, as she also wishes to do to the many friends, known and unknown, who assisted in distributing the schedules. She also desires to express her obligation to the Hon. Carroll D. Wright, for help received in preparing the schedules and for the receipt of advance sheets from the Census of 1890; to the Hon. Horace G. Wadlin and Mr. Charles F. Pidgin, for the courtesies extended at the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor, and also to Professor Davis R. Dewey, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; to Dean Marion Talbot of the University of Chicago, and to Professor Mary Roberts Smith, of the Leland Stanford Junior University; to Mrs. John Wilkinson of Chicago, Mrs. John H. Converse of Philadelphia, and Mrs. Helen Hiscock Backus of Brooklyn, for their constant encouragement and assistance in the work. Most of all the writer is under obligation to Miss A. Underhill for her assistance in reading both the manuscript and the proof of the work, and for the preparation of the Index.

Articles bearing on the subject have at different times appeared in the Papers of the American Statistical Association, The New England Magazine, The Cosmopolitan, and The Forum. These have been freely used in the work, and the writer acknowledges the courtesy of the publishers and editors of these periodicals in allowing this use of her papers.

January 18, 1897.