There was chaos in the air as another argument broke out on the streets of the city. The topic: women’s rights and the never changing manufacturing system. Some claim that it’s been this way since the 19th century, and a change is needed. Others say that the everlasting system of farming, making your own goods, and no women rights is the way to go. People all around were finishing packing their belongings, fed up with the long debates and prepared to move to a country that is up to date with technology.
This isn’t how life truly is, is it? Of course not! Industrialization obviously had mostly positive effects; otherwise, this would probably be a spitting image of what life would look life today. Industrialization had a positive effect on the U.S. society in the late 19th century/ early 20th century. These extremely positive effects include things such as drastic improvements in women’s roles in society and major positive changes in the manufacturing industry.

The first positive effect of industrialization has to do with a very powerful controversy of the time: women’s rights. With the growing industrialization of the U.S., women were granted many rights they would of never dreamed of having a few decades ago. For example, according to “Document 6: Women At Work,” many women were fulfilling the growing needs for working hands across the nation. With the women working, they were able to contribute to the growth of our nation and be more self-sufficient at the same time. On the topic independence, many women were feeling less and less of the pounding pressure to get married as soon as they could. The changing ways of the nation going to rural to urban caused women to feel more comfortable with waiting to marry until they found a man they actually loved; rather than marrying for support or a social status. Another plus of women gaining more rights was the growth of labor unions. With more women on the job, they were able to realize what poor working conditions they were being forced to work in. With their newfound education and rights, they were able to join labor unions and contribute in a big part to the push for better working conditions. According to “Document 3: The Rise of Labor Unions,” the membership of labor unions grew from about 500,000 in 1898 to an astounding 270,000 a short 20 years later! Finally, a positive effect of industrialization in the area of women’s rights was the nineteenth amendment. This amendment stated that women now had the right to vote. With this power, women now were becoming more and more equals to men, contributing to the minimizing of a prejudice society. Of course, women’s roles are only one part of the positive effects of industrialization in the U.S. in the late 19th century/ early 20th century.

Another widely positive effect of industrialization had to do with the vast improvements made in the manufacturing industry around this time. As you know, before this time of industrialization, production in the U.S. was very unproductive. But, with the induction of many new technologies like the assembly line, many positive repercussions were contributing to the ever-growing list of positive effects of industrialization. First of all, with their new productiveness, many people’s salaries were being raised. “The poor could afford what the rich could not before afford.” This is a quote from “Document 1: Andrew Carnegie- Wealth” that just goes to show how drastic of a change in salaries that were a positive result of industrialization. Along with the higher salaries, many workers’ hours were being lowered. This resulted in more people having more leisure time, and more money to spend. With this leisure time, Americans were able to enjoy things unknown to them before- spectator sports, new types of music, and even movies! Also, the growing trend of industrialization in the manufacturing world allowed cities to grow and flourish; for, most manufacturing jobs were located in major cities. Since most of the time this meant overcrowding, we were able to grow by finding new ways to solve these problems. Things like skyscrapers, bridges, and new transportation were things we thought up of to help use solve our problems. Finally, improvements in the manufacturing industry because of industrialization allowed more technology to invented and bought at a more affordable price. This included things such as the high tech machine shown in “Document 5: Photograph of a Georgia Cotton Mill (1909).” As you can clearly see, manufacturing improvements were a huge positive effect of industrialization.

Throughout the course of this essay, I’ve shown you many great examples of why industrialization in the late 19th century and early 20th century was indeed a positive event. As you may recall, this included improvements women’s roles in society and manufacturing changes. Clearly, industrialization did have a positive effect on society; otherwise, where would we be now.