26 BULLETIN 1269, TJ. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
Women and children as wage laborers. — Women and children fur- 
nish much of the extra local labor. They are usually more available 
during rush seasons than men, and are usually considered good farm 
workers, especially as cotton pickers, cane strippers, and tobacco 
workers. 
An estimate, in 1920, on 110 plantations (237,638 acres) in the 
various plantation localities showed an average of 32 per cent (75,047 
acres) of all cultivated land worked by women and children, as shown 
by Table 8. Although some of this was not paid labor, since con- 
siderable work is done as family labor on the tenant farms, yet the 
women and children represent a large potential or actual supply of 
extra-wage workers on the plantation. The largest percentage of 
work by women and children (59 per cent) was reported in the to- 
bacco belt. In the Cotton Belt the largest percentage of women 
and children workers (52 per cent) was found in Alabama (Table 8). 
The rice belt, as would be expected, shows the lowest rate (12 per 
cent) . Practically all these workers were colored. 11 
Sources and methods of holding wage labor. — Regular wage laborers 
are obtained from the class of tenants who, through inefficiency, 
crop failure, or other misfortune, lose their tenant status, and from 
the younger generation. Some transient extra laborers remain as 
regular laborers, and later as croppers or tenants; but, as a rule, 
regular laborers are never transient, except in a local sense, and 
never imported from a distance, except in the Southwest. 
Regular wage laborers, if they have families, are provided with 
cabins or labor quarters with garden if desired; or, if single, board 
and lodging is more often arranged for with tenants on the plantation. 
In many cases, kinsmen aid in providing accommodations. 
A somewhat common practice in the South Atlantic States for 
stabilizing labor, is to give the regular wage laborer a bonus. The 
bonus consists of a few acres of land, rent free, and the privilege of 
using the landlord's team and cultivating tools. 
In the case of local town laborers, daily transportation to and from 
the farm frequently is furnished. Some planters have motor trucks 
for this purpose. This plan has the advantage of relieving the 
plantation from maintaining laborers when they are not needed. On 
the other hand, it lias the disadvantage of compelling the plantation 
operator to engage in costly competition for labor when labor is 
scarce. 
When extra labor is imported from a distance, or is hired locally 
for emergency, housing facilities are provided, with board and lodg- 
ing in some instances. Many plantations have extensive quarters 
for housing ext ra Laborers not living regularly on the plantation. Prac- 
tically all sugar-cane plantations have such equipment as an induce- 
ment to harvest workers. 
Planters report the importation of outside Laborers as detrimental, 
owing to the disturbing influence on local Laborers. Such a means ol 
obtaining Labor is considered of doubtful expediency, particularly in 
the Southeastern States where the negro race furnishes the labor 
" These estimates were obtained from the planters by a careful analysis of the work on the plantation 
for the entire year. The percentage of work estimated for women and children is weighted by the number 
"f 'iiin. ited acres In eacb plantation considered, which reduces the percentage of work to an acreage 
ba i i he percentage, in tui a, was calculated bj areas, as siu.w n in Table 8. Boys ami prls under 15 
• ire cla ifled i children. The estimates shown are considered conservative. 
