Question

Explain how the labor force in the Second Industrial Revolution compared to the labor force in the First Industrial Revolution.

Answer 1

During the first industrial revolution, the affected nations moved from a rural economy, based on agriculture and trade, to an urban, industrialized, mechanized, simplified and, thus, overcrowded economy. In 1800 it was possible to have a sustained growth of wealth that allowed the transition to a wide use of innovative machines, especially in transport and work, abandoning animal traction and production based on manual labor.

During the second industrial revolution The exponential development of railways, while structuring a new model of international trade based on the specialized production of each country and the exchange of materials from standardized prices, also enabled huge migratory movements, like boiler boats that even transported large masses of people on intercontinental trips, as was the case of the 55 million Europeans who migrated to North America between 1850 and 1940.

The cause of the great migrations during the second industrial revolution was, mainly, the tremendous demographic growth that there was in Europe during the eighteenth century, which in turn had different causes.