THE DECLINE OF WOMEN'S WORK SINCE 1871 



101 



chusetts, a farm laborer was paid for a day's work without board 

 in 1752, thirty-three cents; by the time of the Revolutionary War, 

 he was receiving forty cents. The Federal government has made 

 nineteen investigations of wages of farm labor. In the year 1912 

 the report of the Federal government on this subject makes this 

 statement concerning day wages: 



"For day labor other than harvest work, with board, the rate in 1866 

 was sixty-four cents in the United States. It reached sixty-eight cents in 

 1874 or 1875, and declined during the industrial depression of the 'seventies, 

 so that the subsequent increase reached seventy cents in 1881 or 1882. From 

 that year to 1898 the rate of day wages for labor other than harvest work 

 with board remained about stationary except for the depression of the 'nineties. 

 In 1898 the rate was seventy-one cents; in 1899, seventy-five cents; in 1902, 

 eighty-three cents; in 1906, one dollar and three cents; and in 1909, the same 

 amount, one dollar and three cents." 



This shows a very substantial increase in wages in recent years. 

 This increase has been accompanied with an increase in the cost 

 of living. However, wages had risen faster than the cost of living 

 up to the time of the World War. To quote further from the 

 same report : 



"These comparisons establish the conclusion that the money wage rates 

 of farm labor have increased during the 18 years covered in a considerably 



freater degree than the wages of working-men in non-agricultural operations. 

 Q the purchasing power of wages in terms of retail prices of food the working 

 men barely gained from the first period to the second, the mean index number 

 for the second period being 101.4. For the farm laborer the gain was from 

 about 10 to 15 per cent, so that, notwithstanding the great rate of increase of 

 retail prices of food, the rates of wages of farm labor increased in degrees 

 sufficient to make as a net result a substantial rate of increase." 



The Federal government published the following table com- 

 paring the years 1909 and 1915: 



Farm Wages Per Year Without Board 



The Decline of Women's Work Since 1871. The Federal gov- 

 ernment has reported on the subject of Supply of Farm Labor. 



"The outdoor labor of women on farms has undergone an immense reduc- 

 tion within a generation or two. In 1871, the department of agriculture 

 investigated the subject in all parts of the country and these results were 

 published in the report for that year. At that time reports from the following 



