Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/617

 SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 603

The last two definitions are broad enough to include more indus- tries than the garment trades. Indeed, within the last few years it has come to be very generally recognized by those who are interested in labor problems that the conditions of sweating do exist in many other departments of labor, especially in cigar fac- tories, bake-shops, and laundries.

There is still another large class of work which deserves to be called "sweating." It includes those who work in their own homes an excessive number of hours, and often for low wages. A study of every kind of sweating, however, is too broad a field to be entered here. The subject is therefore limited to the gar- ment trades ; but it includes the home-shops, the tailors' "back- shops," the contractors' shops not in their homes, the home finishers, and the home tailors.

In order to understand just the conditions in the garment trades, some general facts must be stated about the kinds of shops and the distribution of the work to be done. A large clothing firm or department store estimates that it will need a certain number of ready-made garments for its spring or fall trade. It may have them made in inside or in outside shops. An inside shop is a room in a part of the store belonging to the firm, or is a separate building elsewhere in the city under the direct management of a superintendent appointed by the firm. Whether to be made in the one or the other kind of shop, the garments are cut, a great many at a time, on the premises of the manufacturer. Steam power is usually used in an inside shop, especially in the separate buildings, and such shops may usually be called "factories." Very few firms have enough inside shops to make all their garments, and most have none at all.

The" manufacturer receives bids from contractors who wish to take the work to their shops, which are called outside, or con- tractors', or often sweat-shops. They usually occupy one floor of a front or rear tenement, or of a small low building erected for the purpose on the rear of the lot. The contractor lives in the same building or in the immediate vicinity. He now acts as employer, and reigns supreme in his own shop. He may have a steam-shop, but more often his necessary equipment consists of