Ch. 20 Sec. 3 & 4 Comprehension – Flashcards

Massive urbanization took places, with small towns revolving around coal mines and industries evolving into giant cities, a thick polluted air, loud pounding noises of engines, the stink of the polluted rivers, working class lived in tenements while the middle and higher class lived in nice neighborhoods, diseases spread rapidly with filth and unsanitary conditions throughout the tenements.

The characteristics included long and stressing working hours, hazardous working environments were bodies could be mutilated or chopped off due to the machines, women were present, along with many children which would ensure the prosperity of a working family, if workers got injured or sick, they would lose their job

The special problems that factory work create for women included new jobs where they would work for at least 12 hours out of their houses, then would have to return home and deal with nourishing and dealing with sick living conditions, which created a very harsh, dull, and stressful living for families.

The conditions of the early industrial age improved with reformers passing laws to improve the working conditions, labor unions were set up, working class men gained the right to vote which gave them some political power, people could visit others in towns when the price of the railroad fell, more jobs arose, wages increased, 'horizons' widened and opportunity increased.

Adam Smith: Believed that a free market with unregulated goods and services would benefit everyone, more goods and lower prices, growing economy would encourage capitalists to reinvest new profits in ventures. Thomas Malthus:He believed that economic decline would come with a larger population growth, since the population would outpace the food supply and the poor would suffer, but his ideas became pessimistic once the food supply was growing rapidly as the centuries went by David Ricardo: Agreed with Malthus that the poor had many children à more children meant a higher labor force which meant less wages for other people, he encouraged the working class to limit their children for a better economic benefit

The utilitarians adopted part of the laissez fair economics and also believed in the individual freedom and whether laws/actions brought happiness, but they also believed that the government should step in to set circumstances and aid the working class. The socialists aimed to eliminate a gap between the rich and the poor, by having means of production being owned by community as a whole rather than individuals, and this would not only benefit one class, but all the classes altogether.

Karl Marx's view of history consisted of economics driving history, with struggle between the classes. The "haves" have always had means of production and attainable power while the "have-nots" were the working class. He believed that the working class would be triumphant in the end and set up a communist society in which everybody would benefit, leaving no rich or poor.

Events have challenged this view because government such as the North American and European ended up reforming their policies in a way that would be helping the working class, where as Marx predicted the working class would have a revolution and be triumphant - this led to flaws in the Marxist argument which led to a loss of popularity. However other areas such as Asia, Latin America, and Africa would adopt Marxist ideas and establish a communist based government to suit their own needs, based on the situation they faced in their time of history.