Industrial Revolution: Victorian Children Part 2

In part 2 on the Industrial Revolution I cover issues relative to child labour relative to the myths of child exploitation regarding the Victorian children. Several of the myths that you will hear claim that mothers and children were enslaved and forced into working in the factories, that the Victorian children were poorly mistreated by the capitalist factory owners and beaten up. Another common myth, as mentioned, relates to the child exploitation, claiming the Victorian children worked endless hours for such little pay.

There is no question that living conditions and the pay was awful during that time period, but when you compare that to where they came from before, the pay was substantially better and relative to part 1 their living conditions had significantly improved thanks to the machinery that capitalism made possible.

An interesting quote by Thomas J. DiLorenzo strikingly puts things into perspective:

"Interestingly, there was never an organized propaganda campaign against child labor in agriculture, even though the work performed on a farm could be every bit as hard and grueling as in any factory. The most likely reason for this is that labor unions were the driving force behind the anti-child labor crusades, and unions were concerned about child labor in large part because it represented competition for union labor. In other words, the unions' first concern was their own membership rolls and dues revenues, not necessarily the welfare of children."

E. P. Thompson's own concession shows this in of itself:

"Child labor was not new, the child was an intrinsic part of the agricultural and industrial economy before 1780. Certain occupations; climbing boys and ships boys were probably worse than all but the worst conditions in the early mills."

Take notice of how he refers to the 'early' mills, this puts into contrast that their working conditions prior to the factories were worse off, but propaganda would like to paint this picture of child labour during the so-called 'evil' factories that they were pure evil. Ask yourself, if they were pure evil, why do you have such luxury today of free time and higher living standards? Again, that is the power one has to spread lies about the Industrial Revolution Victorian children. It tells you a lot when a socialist economic historian, E. P. Thompson comes out and states that concession in his own words.