The Gilded Age was the period in America between the 1870 through 1900. The term Gilded comes from a book written by Mark Twain. Twain thought of the word Gilded to be described as “glittering on the surface but often corrupt and economically unbalanced underneath”. No other words could be used better to describe the Gilded Age. The rich and the poor were well separated and the government was extremely corrupt. Political machine was being used for votes and workers had no rights. Despite all the negative effects that the Gilded Age brought to the United States, several positive things came out of it, such as, the growth of unions and developed fair railroads.
The development of unions was important because of the terrible conditions workers had to work in. Both men and women had to work in order to be able to survive. Children started working from ages eight and nine in the factories to help their parents. Both the women and the children were payed less. On March 25, 1911 a fire broke out in the Triangle Shirtwaist Company, killing most of the workers. Workers began to create a
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Railroad were corrupt and favors the larger business like steal while having small buisness like farmers pay higher rates. Oliver H. Kelly started the organization that wanted gathered farmers together for dances and meeting. Eventually farmers began to notice the injustice of the railroads and demand change. Grange Law attacked the railroads and demanded fair charge for all. This lead to the Wabash Case in 1886 stating that the railroads were unconstitutional for charging more to the farmer. This was also the first time companies were regulated. I believe that this was an important time because companies were beginning to be regulated by the government. Business owners such as Rockefeller and Carnegie could not get away with being unjust employers. Farmers also got treated more fairly and railroads began to be more controlled by the