Working-Class vs. Middle-Class Women Essay Example

each day (ten after a law was passed in 1900) with one lunch break. This break was less than an hour long in which they were not allowed to leave the store.Clerks often had to work overtime with no special compensation. Although clerks “had a few hours of leisure” compared to working class women, the difference cannot be considered “vast” because like “sweat” laborers they were under heavy surveillance and worked in exhausting positions. An investigator in 1910 noted “I saw a new salesgirl who remained standing from 8 a.

m. to 7 p. m. …she was constantly under the threat of a reprimand from her department head…she had to be always smiling, amiable, even when the excessive pace of her work rendered that especially difficult. ” There was a high mortality rate among alesgirls, just as women in the working class, because of the stress their jobs put on their bodies and minds. Although salesgirls made more money than women working in sweatshops, very few could support themselves.

Employers assumed that women were getting financial support from their father or husband. This lack of income resulted in single working class and middle class women prostituting themselves, “The low salaries of most women made it impossible for them to support themselves without male companionship which she acquired ‘at the price of her honor and her dignity. ” All jobs for women were also unstable. As seasons changed or business became poor there were layoffs.

Women were often fired without warning or compensation. To keep the work ethic high, workers were often threatened with termination. Promotions were literally impossible for working class women to obtain, however

they were virtually impossible for middle-class salesclerks to get also. Especially for women’s clerks the possibility of becoming a shop owner was distant.

If they were lucky, some could be promoted into the hierarchy for the store, but this was also much easier for men. Women, especially those who were unmarried, struggled with the oppression of the time period. There were differences between working-class and middle-class women, however there was no “vast social gap. ” Although the lifestyle of the salesgirl looked perfectly glamorous, they struggled with many of the same issues as common laborers.