The "corset" manufacture
is fairly representative of these trades. The following list gives the
per-centage of workers receiving various sums for "indoors" i.e.
"factory" work.
s. s. s. s. s. s. s. s. s. s.
Under 4 3--6 8--10 10--12 12--15 Over 15
2.94 p.c. 50 p.c. 2.94 p.c. 5.9 p.c. 14.7 p.c. 22.52 p.c.
Outdoor workers earn from 6s. to 12s., but where more than 10s. is
earned, the woman is generally assisted by one or more of her children.
Generally speaking, the most miserably paid work is that in trades where
most of the work is done by out-door workers. Such is the lowest stratum
of the "vest and trousers" trade, where English women undertake work
rejected by the lowest class of Jew workers, and the shirt-making trade,
which, in the opinion of the Lords' Committee, "does not appear to
afford subsistence to those who have no other employment." In these and
other trades of the lowest order, 6s. a week is a tolerably common wage
for a work-woman of fair skill to net after a hard week's work, and
there are many individual cases where the wage falls far below this
mark.
It is true that the work for which the lowest wages are paid is often
that of learners, or of inefficient work-women; but while this may be a
satisfactory "economic" explanation, it does not mitigate the terrible
significance of the fact that many women are dependent on such work as
their sole opportunity of earning an honest livelihood.
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