A graphic presentation in the Report on Working Girls and Women of Rochester of the relative positions under the law of two groups of girl workers.
| FACTORY | MERCANTILE |
|---|---|
| Law requires one seat to each girl. | Law requires only one seat to every three girls. |
| 60 minutes for meals. | 45 minutes for meals. |
| Indifferent appearance. | Must dress well. |
| Many sit to work. | On legs most all the time. |
| MINORS | MINORS |
| 8 hours a day, 6 days a week. Not before 8 a. m. or after 5 p. m. | 9 hours a day, 54 hours a week. Not before 8 a. m. or after 7 p. m. |
| WOMEN | WOMEN |
| 9 hours a day, except when making up for a holiday. | Over 21, no limit to hours she may work. Up to 21, 10 hours a day, 60 hours a week. |
| 54 hours a week. | (Law does not apply between Dec. 18th and 24th) |
| Not before 6 a. m. or after 9 p. m. | Not before 7 a. m. or after 10 p. m., if under 21. |
—From the Common Good.
The Common Good, a civic and social periodical of Rochester, devotes its February issue to a compilation by its editor, Edwin A. Rumball, in collaboration with Catherine Rumball, of the facts in regard to the working girls and women of that city who numbered at the 1900 census about 19,000, or over 31 per cent of all the women of Rochester. The facts are for the most part taken from the last census or from the Federal Report on Women and Child Wage-Earners and other authoritative sources, and are handled so as to show Rochester people just how high up or low down in the scale of cities, Rochester stands in its treatment of its women workers. The report is also issued as an “equal pay” document by the woman suffrage organization.
Among the answers to the question why they quit school which Helen M. Todd put to Chicago factory children are the following from Why Children Work in McClure’s:
“Because you get paid for what you do in a factory.”
“Because it’s easier to work in a factory than ’tis to learn in school.”
“You never understands what they tells you in school, and you can learn right off to do things in a factory.”
“They ain’t always pickin’ on you because you don’t know things in a factory.”