Ch 12 America Becoming Industrial Power Flashcards
Changes in Americans Lives
-Not agrarian anymore- moving to cities
-time clocks and whistles to indicate shifts
-have to clock in and out and have whistles that indicate end of shift
-farm work is different from factory work
-farms have different motions in different places, factories have same motion in same place
2nd Industrial Revolution
-rise of industries that build other industries like steel, electrical power, trusts
-american industry helped along by laissez faire where governments didn’t want to limit industries by putting limitations on them
-Businesses grew faster because of exploitation that occurred because of hands off approach
Changes in America’s Industries
-post civil war was steel and petrolium, before it was textiles and food products
-steel industry grows with skyscrapers, railroads, and bridges
-oil industry grows because fuel for factories and homes
Industry growth in New South
-textile factories move closer to south where cotton is
-freedman and poor whites need jobs
-Birmingham AL big steel producer
-American tobacco company produced first machine made cigarettes
Changing Workplace
-consultants began coming into factories and advising industrialists on how to become more efficient and profitable
-Frederick Taylor- mechanical engineer who pioneered scientific management who brought stopwatch and collected data to eliminate slow areas
-became taylorism- hard on workers lost jobs
-pushed for paying workers by the piece- more motivation
Assembly Line
-caused by drive to be more efficient
-Henry Ford owned Ford motor company
-used skilled craftsmen to complete one product before moving onto the next
-assembly line eliminated need for craftsmen and made 250,000 cars per year vs previous 12,000
-workers become a cog in the machine
-interchangable parts- one thing breaks don’t have to throw out the whole product
-workers on assembly line did same task over and over
-ford tried to compensate workers $5 for 12 hours
employees
-jobs could easily be taught to unskilled workers
-Immigrants take over workforce-cheap
-Children hired for small hands
-20% of kids had jobs in industry
-states try to outlaw child labor but governments aren’t regulating business and stay out of it
Women in Workplace
-employers paid men more because they were head of household
-women preferred factory jobs over maids and servants
-Some had education for office job but was rare
-lower class women could be supporting family due to situations, many referred to prostitution
-cultural expectation was for women to marry and quit job but low class had to work after
Robber Barrons
-dynamic generation of business tycoons of men who created businesses that they got rich off of after civil war
-Robber barrons- got wealth by being ruthless with business practices
-both political parties serve the wealthy because they want their money and support and in turn they stay out of business and give barrons say in gov
Andrew Carnegie
-steel
-epitome of american dream success story
-penniless but became richest man in world
John D. Rockefeller
-oil
-controled about 90% of oil in US
-motto- let us prey
-ruthless
Cornelius Vanderbilt
-biltmore estate was his
-many fancy homes
-made money off railroads and steamships
JP Morgan
-made money off banking and investments
Gustavus Swift
-made money off meat packing
-controlled most of the slaughterhouses
Social Darwinism
-darwin created natural selection- survival of the fittest
-barons used this idea to justify taking down small businesses
-they would lower prices until other business was gone then raise the price again
-wealth of business justified
-felt superior to other people
