FARM LABOR IX MASSACHUSETTS, 1921. 
9 
The American-born workers, partly because of the youthfulness 
of so many, were more largely unmarried than the foreign-born. 
(Table 5.) Also, they are less willing than the foreign-born to sub- 
mit to a lower standard of living as a condition of marriage. 
Among the unmarried were a few who reported dependents; 
usually they were helping out their parents' families. A few mar- 
ried reported no dependents. The explanation frequently lay in 
the fact that they were immigrants whose families were still in Europe, 
their support from the laborers cut off as a result of the war. The 
married foreign-born reported an average of nearly four dependents 
while the American-born had scarcely three. 
Table 5. — Marital status and dependents of farm workers. 
Single. 
Married. 
Wid- 
owed. 
Separated 
from 
family. 
Divorced. 
Total. 
Marital status: 
127 
70 
78 
101 
£ 
2 
212 
2 
183 
All 
197 
179 
15 
2 
2 
395 
Number reporting dependents: 
12 
16 
76 
95 
3 
5 
. 
91 

1 
117 
All 
28 
171 
8 

1 
208 
Number of dependents of those reporting: 
American born 
33 
26 
219 
359 
9 
12 
261 
2 
399 
All 
59 
578 
21 
2 
660 
Average number of dependents per case 
reporting: 
2.75 
1.6 
2.9 
3.8 
3.0 
2.4 
2 9 
Foreign born 
2 
3.4 
All 
2.1 
3.4 
2.6 
2 
3.2 
EDUCATION AND OCCUPATIONAL HISTORY OF FARM EMPLOYEES. 
Record of the education received by the laborer was obtained in 
every case (Table 6). Fifty-five had had no schooling whatever, 
and 35 others had been self-taught to some extent; all except 2 of 
these were foreign born. The comparative educational experience 
of American-born and foreign-born farm workers is illustrated by 
Figure 2. That the immigrant had had much less school work is 
plainly shown by the fact that a much smaller proportion had had 
work comparable to even lower grade school work, and while three- 
quarters of the American born had had upper grammar school work 
(and many of them went further), only one-seventh of the foreign 
born had had the same advantage. Some of the latter stated that 
what little education the}' did receive w r as obtained during a few 
winter weeks in the homeland at considerable effort, cost, and at a 
distance from home. To regroup, practically 1 hired farm worker in 
7 was illiterate; nearly 2 in 5 had had elementary schooling only, and 
1 in 6 had had work beyond grammar school. 
68304°— 24 2 
