Revolution Industrial Revolution

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What Really Happened During The Industrial Revolution
By: Brianna Taylor

Would you like to work fourteen hours a day, six days a week, for little to no pay? While this might seem unreal to us now, this is what working Americans during the time of the Industrial Revolution endured. Not only was it adults working, it was also children as young as three. Now you look at it and think what could a three year old have done? When people running factories just saw it as smaller hands to do things an adult couldn’t. Looking back at the Industrial Revolution I have four main reasons on how the Industrial Revolution was more of a hindrance than a help to working Americans those reasons include working conditions, child labor, long term effects and overpopulation.
The Industrial Revolution lasted from about 1870 to 1900 (Collier pg. 9). The Industrial Revolution was a time when new technologies were being produced and people started working to make those products. Many inventions were developed during this time that made work easier and is the basis for the things we now have. Inventions like the cotton gin, telephone, and steam engine. The main development that helped bring the Industrial Revolution to America was the Transcontinental Railroad. The railroad helped us transport products across the country and was the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in America. The Industrial Revolution helped introduce the idea of people working to produce products and the idea of developing new technologies to make work easier. The Industrial Revolution also helped make cars and cell phones, these things took time to make the way they are now but they started during this time. While this all seems good there were many negative effects ...

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...s were pretty bad for the working class. People were just happy to have a job and make the little amount of money they did. I think that these problems could have been solved by not having people working so long and if they were paid more money. If the working conditions of workplaces were better, disease and physical deformities wouldn’t have been an issue. If the conditions, not only for working but for living, were better I think the problems I see with the Industrial Revolution could be solved. In my opinion labor laws should have regulated the age of a child and how long they could work. If this had happened, children could be educated and have time to play. As a child they shouldn’t have to work like that. Overall the obstacles the working class in America had to overcome just to live and support their families were unfair and they should have been better.

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