Zinn Chapter 14 Essays - Industrial Workers Of The World, Business

Zinn Chapter 14 Upton Sinclair, Jack London, Theodore Dreiser, and Frank Norris, were some of the few who spoke for socialism or criticized the capitalist system. They wrote about how nice life would be if everyone were to work hard and share their riches. Fredrick W. Taylor worked in a steel company who came up with a system in which made workers interchangeable. He made them do simple tasks that the new division of labor required; calling it Taylorism. Taylorism with its simplified unskilled jobs, became more feasible. Working conditions in the factories were horrible. Accidents such a fires would occur. There were hat and cap makers that were getting respiratory diseases due to being exposed to dangerous chemicals that were inhaled. In the year 1914, there was 35,000 workers killed in industrial accidents and 700,000 injured. This led workers to go on strike for better working conditions, securing high wages, and shorter work week for its members, who were only skilled workers. Because of these w orking conditions, labor unions were starting to form. 80% of workers were part of the American Federation of Labor (AFL) which was formed by Samuel Gompers. The people that were in the American Federation of Labor were socialists, anarchists, and radical trade unionists all united and created the Industrial Workers of the World (I.W.W.). Industrial democracy is one thing all people of the I.W.W. fought for. They wanted their message to be known and spread everywhere so they traveled, organized, and wrote where ever they could. The people of the I.W.W. aimed to organize any worker in any industry into this "one big union," undivided by sex, skill, or race. Women even started forming unions because they could not deal with the unfair rules hey had to follow. At one school teachers had to follow 10 rules, some of them being: "don't get married, don't dress in bright colors, and don't wear dresses more than two inches above the ankle." Two of the many unions were the Teachers League an d the Women's Trade Union League. They went on strike for change in their jobs which were being teachers, store workers, nurses, and switch board operators. Strikes were starting to multiply, in 1904 there were 4,000 strikes a year. Many Americans began to think of socialism when the government and military force sided with the rich. Labor problems had the chance of becoming solved, but resources remained in the hands of powerful corporations which commanded the government. Oklahoma was the strongest socialist state organized in 1914.