The period of 1870-1910 was an era of vigorous economic growth in the United States. Steel, oil, and railroad industries, among others, had rapidly expanded and generated huge profits, which consequently increased the gross domestic product of the nation. The multitudes of immigrants were considered a ready source of cheap labor that stimulated industrialization. On the one hand, a wider economic aisle emerged, which was, however, accompanied by the growing problems of workers and the labor force, which manifested in the form of strikes and other protests. This presented a paradox where labor protests escalated despite economic prosperity. The protests were fueled by extreme inequalities in wealth and unfair distribution of gains, hazardous working conditions and exploitation of workers, and suppression of labor rights and disenfranchisement of the working class from political power. Despite the period of 1870 to 1910 being generally prosperous for the United States, labor protests developed due to the stark wealth disparities, harsh working conditions,suppression of labor rights, and the emergence of labor unions as vehicles for collective action.
Rising Income Inequality and Unfair Distribution of Gains
Despite rising aggregate output and incomes nationally, the gains were distributed extremely unequally, with capitalists and industrial titans accumulating massive fortunes. At the same time, ordinary workers faced declining real wages and deepening poverty. Capitalist robber barons and industrial titans largely captured all the economic gains, while ordinary workers faced stagnant or declining real wages and income inequality. The contradictory state of the economy, with wealth accumulation for the big corporations combined with little or no benefit to the labor class, ignited the flames of working-class radicalism and protests.
Despite substantial economic growth lifting G.D.P. and generating vast fortunes for men like Rockefeller, Carnegie, and JP Morgan, working-class Americans saw surprisingly negligible gains compared to skyrocketing productivity. Consequently, labor agitation grew dramatically during this ‘Gilded Age.’ Real average annual earnings for non-farm workers rose only $29 from 1870 to 1910 – from $380 to $409. This represented a tiny pay boost for over four decades of soaring national economic output. Profits were usually invested back into capital or taken as profits by entrepreneurs and business people instead of being distributed to workers as higher wages. The rich amassed a tremendous amount of wealth in a short period, while ordinary workers had to live in tenement houses and work without workplace protections. Such a paradox of overall national wealth accumulating alongside deep labor exploitation became the source of the left-oriented labor protests and the struggle for wealth redistribution.
The workers started losing all motivation to work for long hours in dangerous places while people became richer through their sweat and labor. Despite the fact that most unions were not seeing much benefit from economic growth, labor unions such as the Knights of Labor and I.W.W. (Industrial Workers of the World) often advocated more radical policies demanding higher pay, better working conditions, shorter hours, and the creation of social welfare programs. Due to the fact that real wages for workers failed to catch up with the great industrial expansion and productivity growth, the labor movement challenged this trend. It demanded a fair portion of the newly created wealth from the economy. Workers, in effect, rebelled against a state of affairs in which an economy was healthy nationally, while industry earnings set record highs, yet wages lagged.
Hazardous Working Conditions
In contrast to the growing economy, workers were still forced to endure harsh and life-threatening conditions at work. The construction of railways, steel mills, oil refineries, and factories was contingent on the use of immigrant and child laborers who were working for many hours under unstable conditions. As the economy’s top-line indicators, such as aggregate output and profits, reached new highs year after year, there occurred a dramatic decline in the working standards and safety conditions for ordinary workers. On average, thirty-five thousand workers died annually in accidents in this period, and over a million became injured as well. In 1907 alone, with no modern safety regulations, machinery accidents fatally injured more than 500 people weekly. Company doctors and lawyers made agreements to stop disabled workers from getting disability pensions or compensation. Lead poisoning, inhalation of smoke, and contamination by unsanitary living were also the major contributors to death.
Though they created the prosperous industries that many nations rely on today, workers were given nothing for their efforts – no legislation regulating workplace safety, no job protection or insurance. This stark disparity between the growing economy and poor labor conditions of the workers fueled major labor organizing and strikes calling for reforms. It is the fact that enterprises were not investing any considerable chunk of their growing revenues in improving labor safety and wages, but only in letting increasingly uncontrolled, unregulated working environments happen, that gave the working class the reason to get organized and strike, protest, and join such organizations as A.F.L. and I.W.W.
Instead of balancing capitalist expansion with better workers’ security, benefits, and standards, capitalist exploitation intensified the unsafe conditions that ultimately fueled additional profits. Workers expected that their wages could grow significantly if distributed fairly due to the higher economic prosperity. So, the shocking reality of labor turning to be dangerous, while capitalists were employing ruthless means to accumulate wealth unseen before, stirred protests and belligerent organizing of workers to correct the inequity between the rich and the poor by redistributing the wealth into decent working conditions. This provoked the working class and their demands for more balanced and regulated industrial relations that would be favorable for labor safety instead of enormous profits.
Political Disenfranchisement and Suppression of Labor Rights
The growth of the industrial giants and national industries in the 1870-1910 period symbolized the advancement of the American economy. However, the working class discovered that their political representation and labor rights were oppressed; thereby, the new prosperity was not shared fairly. This disparity of unregulated economic growth, paralleled by protests and unrest, was a consequence of labor lacking legislative influence or collective bargaining powers.
While industrialization was accompanied by the construction of large railways and the boom of the mining, oil, and manufacturing companies, labor itself couldn’t share the political power and participate in the making of policies. The government used militias and force to regularly help companies in breaking down strikes. The police arrested and harassed the labor leaders rather than controlling the powerful capitalists who were maintaining politics. Courts proved to be favorable for capitalists and unfavorable for labor unions that were denied favorable regulations and injunctions.
This open discrimination of labor from economic and legislative influence came in parallel with the workers who were creating the thriving corporations that pampered American prosperity. The ruling class did not produce anything. They simply appropriated the fruits of the labor of the working class and then exploited them to make politics work for them. Workers were the mainstay of industrial growth as they toiled in the sweat of their brows while the politicians on both sides were ferociously representing the interests of the robber barons who became filthy rich. Workers could not secure safer regulations, welfare programs, or even the recognition of their right to organize. However, they were the very ones pulling the strings for national growth that fanned the flames of resentment and unrest.
The booming economics and labor suppression activated unions and radical leaders who advocated for more radical activism, some of which were even violent. They contended the already distorted industrial relations system could never give justice as long as the workers did not retain more power to balance the scale, even if illegally. Despite the political disenfranchisement that persisted with the growth of national wealth and abundance, the protesters who were motivated by the redistribution of newly created wealth in an equal manner went as far as using force.
In short, the laboring class has been the backbone of the American industrial take-off and the growing G.D.P., but it has had no say in the economic system that oppresses them and has received no share in the wealth they have created. Their frustration with the fact that while they had worked hard to build a prosperous economy, they now did not enjoy its benefits but only had to bear its consequences turned into anger and labor radicalism. Workers resorted to strikes, sit-downs, sabotage, and other forms of extra-parliamentary struggles to resist exploitation and obtain a share of the nationally occurring improvements in working standards, rights, and distribution of the gains that were concentrated in elite capitalist hands.
The political disconnect between economic health and labor rights fueled the continuously growing working-class movement, which demanded not only representation and justice but also compliance with increasing oppression in order to produce more profit. The gains in national prosperity that came at the price of violating the basic rights and welfare of workers could not last for long without arousing the anger of the masses. As the oppressed workers recognized that the existing order of things had become broken, they began to organize against it.
Emergence of Labor Unions
During this period, the working class, who were the victims of rampant industrialization and corporate dominance, found their wages declining and their rights violated. This awakened the unions, which championed fair sharing of the new prosperity. The extreme wealth disparity, hazardous working conditions, and labor rights suppression by the nation, despite plenty, have been the driving forces for the union formation to fight for the reforms.
The titans such as Rockefeller and Carnegie became very rich by founding huge companies in steel, oil, rail, and banking. However, the workers saw very little of all these gains. Through ordinary labor drove output, productivity, and business revenues to all-time highs, real wages for non-farm workers rose only marginally – from $380 to $409 annually between 1870 and 1910. Hourly wages also fell behind soaring business income, with labor’s share of income dropping from 71% in 1873 to 58% by 1913. Workers even lost wage-boosting leverages like workplace bargaining powers or the ability to afford to lose their jobs during strikes.
The imbalance has seen booming economics in industry, but stagnant wages for laborers have seen the rise of trade unions like the A.F.L. and I.W.W. to protect workers’ rights and compensation. These were directed to grab the wealth of the people, who had no right to the profits made possible by their sweat and labor. Unions arose to contain the monopolistic powers of Standard Oil, to regain the workplace bargaining power through alliance, and to deliver justice to workplaces that expose laborers to hazardous situations at the mercy of profiteering. They organized for higher wages and decreased work hours, creating workplace regulations and safety measures and old age pensions using strike funds paid from their dues.
Basically, labor, which really propelled the boom of major industries and corporations, was experiencing worsening status and security instead of development as the Gilded Age was growing rapidly. They organized into a check to the great consolidated power of capitalists, who dominated politics and economy while simultaneously suppressing labor rights within their industries, which workers had been building successfully. With strikes, protests, and political lobbying, unions tried to achieve a state of equilibrium and guard against the unrestrained power of industrial magnates. The trade unions became the instrument through which workers could struggle for a fairer distribution of the new economic wealth they were creating but which was being concentrated in the hands of a few at their expense.
The spirit of a growing labor union upsurges while the nation enjoys shared prosperity can be rationalized by the existence of extreme wealth inequality and concentration of wealth, denying most Americans a chance to enjoy the progress they worked for. The powerless masses have organized into large collectives to meddle in politics, and the class of the capitalist class dominates the political system and workplaces, while the exploited unprotected labor whose prosperity is driven by this exploited, unprotected labor is rewarded richly. The working class are those who, through unions, have fought for their fair share.
The period from 1870 to 1910 was, in general, prosperous for the U.S.A., but the labor protests developed because of the growing wealth gap, substandard working conditions, suppression of labor rights, and the emergence of labor unions as a tool for collective action. The United States saw growth, industrialization, and an increase in G.D.P. during this period, which shows that there was inclusive progress for all Americans. Nevertheless, as one delves deeper into the era, one notices that the rich profited at the expense of the poor, who were paid unequal wages compared to the capital’s soaring profits, worked in hazardous conditions without any safety measures, and were politically disenfranchised. These dynamics generated the radicalization of labor during the era of apparent national prosperity. Workers went on strike and formed unions to appropriate a more fairly distributed share of the gains they made possible through their labor in dangerous mines, factories, and workshops. The paradox of progress for the capitalist, being accompanied by severe labor unrest, in fact, stemmed from the unregulated capitalist system that was prevalent during the period.
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