Moreover, this enquiry has shown that there is but little chance for women in these trades to improve themselves. Openings for responsible employment are few, and the ambition of the woman is not stirred by the possibility of material improvement as the reward of skill and industry. When responsible places become vacant, it is sometimes difficult to get women to consent to fill them. They seem to have little of that divine discontent which is the mainspring of progress. "They never ask for a rise as a man would, ... though after a time when they are useful, the firm would be quite willing to give one." "He finds that girls want to earn a certain wage. As a rule they will not take less, and they don't trouble to earn more." A Manchester correspondent reports: "There is very little chance of rising, and no particular desire for it, on the part of the ordinary girl, whose main aspirations are otherwise directed."
Reporting generally on her enquiries, an investigator writes: "The progressive young woman, eager to show that she is man's equal and can do man's work, seems to be a product of the middle classes. I never met girls with ambitions of that sort among the employees I talked with. On the other hand, I have met with cutting reproofs from forewomen and others in the bookbinding houses when I tried, in my innocence, to find out why they did not turn their hands to simple and easy processes which were being done by men. 'Why, that is man's work, and we shouldn't think of doing it!' is the usual answer given with a toss of the head and a tone insinuating that there is a certain indelicacy in the question." Another investigator reports: "In a paper-staining department an attempt was once made to have a forewoman instead of a foreman over the girls, but she was not successful in watching the colours and had to be replaced by a man. The employer in consequence came to the conclusion that such a feat was beyond a woman's power, and the workers themselves are of the same opinion and scorn the idea of a forewoman."
Sex reputation.
Women in slowly increasing numbers seem to be settling down to a thorough industrial training, but except when they start businesses of their own, the general reputation of woman as workers, especially their liability to marry and leave, must permanently handicap the most efficient in search of employment.
Even the woman who has paid a premium of £50 or £100 for thorough instruction in the art of bookbinding is warned that "a worker cannot be taken on anywhere, but has to set up on her own account," and even then she often does not enter the regular open competitive market, but attaches certain customers to herself, owing to her special work.
The exceptional woman will always have to bear the burden of the average woman.
The questions put to employers upon this point received very emphatic replies: "It does not pay us to train women," they said in some form or another; "We only want them for simple processes such as folding, and if we tried to make them skilled in more complicated work they would leave us before we got the same return for our trouble as we get from men."
Physique, hours, etc.
The low standard of women's living also diminishes their stamina and strength, and though in the course of this enquiry we have not discovered any very serious complaint that women were irregular at their work owing to ill-health (a common complaint against women in offices), yet the drawback has been mentioned.
Moreover, it must be noted that when a girl's work in the workshop is finished she has often to go home to commence a new round of domestic tasks from which a boy is exempted. This aggravates the seriousness of her long hours of mechanical work as a wage-earner, and increases the difficulties placed in her way should she desire to attend evening technical classes. The directors of several educational institutions and the teachers of technical classes for women have strongly urged this point upon us.