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                LABELING                                         group, they could pressure employers to respond to their
                                                                 demands.
                SEE Packaging
                                                                    The progression of the Industrial Revolution and the
                                                                 formation of labor unions go hand in hand. The Indus-
                                                                 trial Revolution brought about specialization of employ-
                LABOR                                            ees in the workplace and a dramatic increase in
                                                                 production. This factory system, which developed in the
                SEE Factors of Production
                                                                 nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, brought to
                                                                 workers both prosperity (steady employment in good eco-
                                                                 nomic times) and hardship (bad working conditions and
                                                                 unemployment) during depressions. Thus, the Industrial
                LABOR UNIONS
                                                                 Revolution changed the American class structure, turning
                A labor union has been defined as “a group of workers who  skilled tradesmen into the working class, who found it
                have banded together to achieve common goals in the key  very difficult to escape factory life.
                areas of wages, hours, and working conditions” (Boone
                                                                    As more and more workers united to improve their
                and Kurtz, 2005). Originally, labor unions were primarily  situation, two types of labor unions emerged. Craft
                made up of male, blue-collar workers, but as the economy  unions were made up of workers who were skilled in a
                of the United States evolved from production industries to  specific trade. Many craft unions were organized in the
                service industries, union membership has seen a dramatic  1790s, such as the Philadelphia shoemakers in 1792, the
                increase in white-collar and female workers.     Boston carpenters in 1793, and the New York printers in
                                                                 1794.
                HISTORY AND EVOLUTION                               Beginning in 1827, laborers who worked in the same
                Labor unions began to evolve in the United States in the  industry, regardless of their specific job, formed industrial
                1700s and 1800s because of the need for safety and secu-  unions, such as the United Steel Workers and the Team-
                rity for workers. Workers formed labor unions in response  sters. The 1837 depression nearly wiped out these unions,
                to intolerable working conditions, low wages, and long  but they were reborn shortly before the Civil  War
                hours. In the wake of the Industrial Revolution, men,  (1861–1865) and became strong enough to survive reces-
                women, and even children worked in unsafe factories  sions.
                from dawn to dark every day of the week for only pennies  Five major labor organizations emerged between
                a day. These oppressive conditions forced workers to look  1866 and 1936. The National Labor Union was organized
                for ways to improve their situation.  They gradually  in 1866. Though it became a political party and collapsed
                learned that by banding together and bargaining as a  within six years, it did successfully bring together into a


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