URBAN LABOR
This city symbolized industrial opportunity and exploitation in Sister Carrie.
What is Chicago?
Women in the Gilded Age were largely confined to these types of jobs
What are low-paying, unstable jobs?
In Sister Carrie, wealth is most often signaled by this.
What is clothing and appearance?
The belief that anyone can succeed through hard work alone.
What is the American Dream?
Workers used this tactic to demand better conditions.
What are strikes?
This weekly wage shows the limited options available to working women.
What is $4.50 a week?
This factor made women more economically vulnerable than men.
What is lack of job security and legal protection?
This law tried to limit monopolies but failed to protect workers.
What is the Sherman Antitrust Act?
Dreiser challenges this belief using this literary movement.
What is naturalism?
This modern movement advocates raising the minimum wage.
What is Fight for $15?
This type of job Carrie secures after repeated rejection.
What is factory work?
This character trait makes Carrie vulnerable to manipulation.
What is inexperience?
This group held the most economic power during the Gilded Age.
Who were industrialists/corporations?
This force shapes Carrie’s fate more than morality.
What is environment/economic pressure?
This law sets minimum wage and overtime rules today.
What is the Fair Labor Standards Act?
This 1894 labor strike exposed wage cuts and worker frustration.
What is the Pullman Strike?
This social expectation limited women’s independence and wages.
What is traditional gender roles?
This court trend often sided with business over labor.
What are Lochner-era decisions?
This describes the city’s attitude toward workers.
What is indifference?
This modern labor issue mirrors Gilded Age inequality.
What is the gig economy?
This economic system prioritized profit over worker welfare.
What is industrial capitalism?
This group was often excluded from early labor unions.
Who were women workers?
This reform movement tried to address inequality without overthrowing capitalism.
What is the Progressive Movement?
This idea does Dreiser reject.
What is success being based solely on virtue?
This is the main goal of labor reform, past and present.
What is fair wages and worker protection?