In feverish eagerness the boys spent their time wandering from shop to shop, from work to works, making short stays, frequently of only one or two weeks, in search of the new El Dorado. Indentures were thrown to the winds; places where useful trades could be learned were left behind; entreaties of employers were rejected; parents were often treated with indifference. The persistence with which the boys took up the trail to the great machine shops and to the great national factories or to any other place where the processes were repetitive and the contracts ran into millions, can be compared almost to the rush to the Klondyke....
Fearful that such large earnings would only be temporary, they apparently determined to make hay while the sun shone. They began to assume the independence which their comparatively large incomes seemed to justify. They sometimes became reckless, spendthrift and extravagant. The gambling instinct was kindled, the longing for adventure became acute. The boys became restless and unstable in the works. Avarice begat avarice, until, in some cases, the boys set such a value on their labor as to make them appear almost ridiculous.[249]
Even certain labor organizations, which are generally bitterly opposed to all such plans, advocated attention to schemes of compulsory saving or deferred payment, as a means of preventing the waste of abnormally high wages.[250]
Almost the only hopeful feature of the effect of the war on working children is a changed point of view regarding their future needs. The bad conditions, together with the losses of the great war, roused greater interest in the conservation of childhood. The chapter on “Peace and Reconstruction” will trace the growth of the movement which, with respect to working children, recognizes that many of them should be taken out of the labor market altogether, that their opportunities for education should be improved, and that their first years of work should be better supervised.
CHAPTER XIV
Effects of War Work on Women
The tremendous movement of women into industry and the shifting from low paid to high paid occupations have given a foundation for a permanent improvement in the economic status of women, and it is hoped that their new independence and interest in public affairs will survive postwar adjustments and remain as a permanent asset. The physical endurance of many of the women doing war work was a matter of constant comment. But the increase in the tuberculosis death rates suggests that the final results of intensive and difficult work have not yet been determined. However, certain definite effects of war work upon the health, home life and personality of women and children should be noted.
Health of Women War Workers
Definite investigations of the health of women workers were mainly confined to the munitions industry and were made by the Health of Munition Workers Committee. The general conclusion of the committee that by the latter months of 1915 the health of the munition makers, both men and women, had been injured through overwork, has been much quoted in the United States:
Taking the country as a whole, the committee are bound to record their impression that the munition workers in general have been allowed to reach a state of reduced efficiency and lowered health which might have been avoided without reduction of output by attention to the details of daily and weekly rests.
The committee’s statements about female workers alone were of similar tenor: