The industrial revolution continued driving innovation in the workplace and across the world by increasing speed and efficiency of commoditized work through gains in efficiently and mechanization despite social conflicts, wars, and legal challenges redefining work in America. Industrialization’s demand for labor benefited as the world’s population increased by fifty seven percent during the mid-eighteen century and doubling by the twentieth century. Individuals like John D. Rockefeller, Henry Ford, Jay Gould, and Andrew Carnegie became extremely wealthy by combining technological innovations with a booming supply of labor and large amounts of capital. Industrialists capitalized on plentiful, low cost labor to become extremely wealthy but became known as ‘robber barons’ because industrialists extracted wealth at the expense of those producing the output. Industrialists argued America’s economy would never have attained the heights achieved without them. Jay Gould rhetorically asked where America would be without corporations that developed …show more content…
Laws, unions, strikes, violence, culture, and politics played key roles in determining rules governing labor. Workers struck, formed unions, and engaged in the political process to alter the balance of power. Firms advocated for their interests using similar methods and fought to survive in a competitive marketplace where booms and busts remained common. The legal system in America struggled to keep up but provided a forum to mediate the control of work. Laws such as Contract Labor Law, Foran Act, Erdman Act, Clayton Act, LaFollette Seamen's Act, Transportation Act, Clayton Act, Wagner Act, Social Security Act, and Fair Labor Standards Act along with many others became key milestones in the tug of war between labor and