Gene CroweS.S 910/30/17
How did People’s Lives Change because of Mechanization and the Factory System?
Mechanization and the Factory System changed how people lived, worked, made money, as well as different standards being involved.
One example of this was the increase of people moving into the cities. People needed to find work and working in the factories was the go to option. Factory owners offered the workers housing for their family in crowded communities where living conditions were not very sanitary and crime rates were very high. This was a result of living in newly established cities where the sewer system had yet to be installed, and where crime was driven by poverty. However, this offered everything they needed for themselves and their families.
Another example of change is mechanization in factories. Before, all of the work done inside factories had to be done either by hand or in the textile industry's case, one man operated looms. With the introduction of the steam engine and its ability to power factories, the process of making goods was changed. Machines like the Flying Shuttle or Spinning Jenny did the work of thousands of manual workers in a fraction of the time, decreasing manual labor. With clothing being mass produced in factories, the overall price of the finished goods costed less so it could be even more affordable.
My last example of this is child labour. Children worked in the textile, coal industry and chimney sweeps. Factory owners wanted children for their small size. Children worked in dangerous conditions, worked long hours , and were paid very little for their efforts. Some examples of harmful conditions include inhalation of microscopic fibers, loss of hearing due to machine noise, children beingbeaten, coal mines being filled with toxiccoal dust, and growth in children being stunted. It wasn’t until new labour laws were introduced that gave factory workers less hours and prohibited the employment of children under the age of nine.
In conclusion, mechanization and the factory system overall, determined what jobs people had, the amount of work they had to do, how people supported themselves and families, and changed certain standards involved in the factory system.