Working Life in the 1890’s

Here we are at another Thursday here in Aussie land so it is time for a little more about life in the 1890’s here in Australia. This week we are looking at the clothing trade during the 1800’s the clothing industry consisted of three major sectors those being tailoring, dressmaking and millinery.

Tailoring was divided into coat, vest and trouser making, males were taught to make all garments while females made only one or two items. This led to the deskilling of tailoressess and the setting of low wages. Of course this saw men’s wages increase over time, with much of the sewing involved being done on steam powered machines.

The making of shirts, dresses and underclothing was left to the lower paid women to do.

An inquiry into the sweating system in Victoria in 1890 revealed the terrible conditions faced by some workers. It was reported that some women worked between 60 and 84 hours a week making clothes as diverse as dungarees, silk shirts and tweed trousers. One woman who worked 84 hours a week making tweed trousers at eight or ten shillings per dozen earning a total of only 31 shillings for all her work. She was the only one earning a wage as her husband was blind.

Some improvements were made in the late 1890’s when the wages board was set up to determine fair wages for factories and rates a piece of work for factories and outwork.

From this time the use of outwork began to drop off as it was less economical and at least on the surface the so called sweated labour less common. However, it was more likely driven further underground as desperate women fought to earn even a few shillings.