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Second Industrial Revolution Essay

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An Industrial Revolution is the “change in social and economic organization that resulted from the replacement of the hand tools with machines and from the development of large-scale industrial production” (Danzer R50). The Second Industrial Revolution happened nearly one hundred years later after the First Industrial Revolution in England during the 1760s (Fagnilli 7). The Second Industrial Revolution was the cause of new inventions, government support for business, common natural resources, and increasing population (Fagnilli 7). The Industrial Revolution in the United States had impact on the economy, cities, workers, and environment (Fagnilli 7). The Second Industrial Revolution in the United States was paramount to changes …show more content…

During the Second Industrial Revolution the work conditions in the big factories was very poor. In the dangerous factories there were over two thousand deaths and twenty thousand injuries per year (Fagnilli 7). The majority of the workers in the poor work conditioned factories were immigrants (Fagnilli 7). In the Central Pacific, factories workers were mostly immigrants of Chinese or Hispanic descent (Fagnilli 7). In the Union Pacific, factories workers were mostly Irish, African American, or Civil War Veterans (Fagnilli 7). The Chinese workers that worked in the west made around thirty dollars per month (Fagnilli 7). The average white worker would make around forty to sixty dollars per month with meals includes (Fagnilli 7). The factory owners would discriminate against people by their race. The conditions inside the factories were horrible, they called them sweatshops. A sweatshop is a shop or factory in which employees work for long hours at low wages and under unhealthy conditions (Merriam-Webster). The poor work conditions and low wages in the workplace is what caused many strikes throughout the nation, leading to union’s. In the Second Industrial Revolution there was a great deal of work being done but the workers had to go through poor work conditions to be able to have a meal on the table for there family. In the 1860s through the 1900s, the working person was greatly impacted by the Second Industrial Revolution.

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