wholesome conditions. I pointed out, that while the workpeople are practically incapable of doing themselves this sanitary justice, they are unable to obtain any effective support from the paid adminstrations of the sanitary police.… The life of myriads of workmen and workwomen is now use lessly tortured and shortened by the never-ending physical suffering that their mere occupation begets.”[1] In illustration of the way in which the workrooms influence the state of health, Dr. Simon gives the following table of mortality.[2]
| Number of persons of all ages employed in the respective industries. | Industries compared as regards health. | Death rate per 100,000 men in the respective industries between the stated ages. | ||
| Age 25-35. | Age 35-45. | Age 45-55. | ||
| 958,265 | Agriculture in England & Wales | 743 | 805 | 1,145 |
| 22,301 men 12,379 women |
London tailors | 958 | 1,262 | 2,093 |
| 13,803 | London printers | 894 | 1,747 | 2,367 |
d. Modern Domestic Industry.
I now come to the so-called domestic industry. In order to get an idea of the horrors of this sphere, in which capital conducts its exploitation in the background of modern mechanical industry, one must go to the apparently quiet idyllic trade of nail-making,[3] carried on in a few remote villages of England. In this place, however, it will be enough to give a
- ↑ Public Health. Sixth Rep. Lond. 1864, p. 81.
- ↑ l. c., p. 30. Dr. Simon remarks that the mortality among the London tailors and printers between the ages of 26 and 36 is in fact much greater, because the employers in London obtain from the country a great number of young people up to 30 years of age, as “apprentices” and “improvers,” who come for the purpose of being perfected in their trade. These figure in the census as Londoners, they swell out the number of heads on which the London death-rate is calculated, without adding proportionally to the number of deaths in that place. The greater part of them in fact return to the country, and especially in cases of severe illness. (l. c.)
- ↑ I allude here to hammered nails, as distinguished from nails cut out and made by machinery. See Child. Empl. Comm., Third Rep, p. xi, p. xix, m. 125-130, p. 58,n. 11, p. 114, n. 487, p. 187, n. 674.
