In: Economics
discuss the rise of professions and the middle class in the United States
Basically the middle class could be a class of individuals
in an exceedingly social hierarchy in terms of occupation, income,
education and rank. Most of the people of United
States during the teenager Age worked for low wages, in factories
or sweatshops and returning in the dark to crowded and
unsanitary housing. But within the new era of industry and
innovation didn’t only produce misery: as factories and commercial
enterprises expanded, they required a military of bookkeepers,
managers, and secretaries to stay business running smoothly. These
new clerical jobs, which were receptive women further as men,
fostered the expansion of a social class of educated office workers
who spent their surplus income on a growing kind of commodity and
activities.
The Gilded Age
boom also produced immense wealth for those fortunate few who took
advantage of their own smarts and therefore the government’s
laissez-fairepolicies to become
titans of industry. By 1890, one-hundredth of the population
controlled 25 percent of the wealth because the gap between the
rich and poor grew; contemporaries debated what America’s new
aristocrats owed to the remainder of society.
In 1862,
Congress passed the Morrill assignment Act, which gave federal
lands for the aim of building public universities. Educational
activity, once reserved for the kids of the elite, was now
receptive a replacement class of children. Women, also as men, took
advantage of latest educational opportunities. At the top of the
century, about 40 percent of school graduates were women.
Educated men
and girls entered the working world as managers and clerical
workers. Companies generally reserved these choice positions for
white, native-born employees.
Women’s ideally working for
operating typewriters and telephone switchboards, and their smaller
paychecks saved employers money. but, women found new era of
freedom and independence as wage-earners.
Consumption
Members of the middle
class wanted to spend the additional profit their pockets on
material comforts and leisure activities. Middle-class women
browsed new shops like Macy’s and Marshall Field’s, which offered
ready-made clothes and household goods, buying what an earlier
generation of ladies would have made reception. As their incomes
rose, so too did the number of leisure middle and upper- class
families could enjoy. For those that had time to play, cities
offered many options. Theatre and shows, parks, circuses and
sporting events drew more crowds.
The middle
class puzzled out quickly what it wanted to try to to with its
money: purchase goods and celebrate. But all of the amusements
within the world would barely make a dent within the fortunes
amassed by the Gilded Age elite. Were they morally certain to use
it for the general public good? Some of people of the time believed
it may actually harm community for the rich to lift up the poor;
Social Darwinists thought that interfering with the “survival of
the fittest” would prevent the humanity from evolving.
In “The Gospel
of Wealth,” Carnegie took a special stance. He argued that great
inequalities of wealth were a natural consequence of business
society, but that the rich must engage in
philanthropy
to form sure that the deserving poor had a
chance to enhance them. Rather than living ostentatiously, leaving
money to heirs or willing their fortunes to charity after death,
wealthy individuals must donate to worthy causes while they were
still alive. This way, a have could “administer [his wealth] within
the manner which, in his judgment, is best calculated to provide
the foremost beneficial results for the
community.