I am not sure if the comparison is valid, due to the different dates of the information, but I found the following interesting:

In 1871 the National Watch Co. (Elgin) had roughly equal numbers of men and women in their employ, but the women earned an average of $6 to $12 per week while the men and boys earned $3 per 10-hour day. My source, the 1871 Nat'l Watch Co. Illustrated Almanac, does not indicate whether this was for a 5 or 6 day workweek, but I suspect the latter, in which case the men earned 1-1/2 to three times what the ladies earned.

In the 1873 Elgin Almanac it is related that for the women, doing equal work, there is "a decided difference - from one to two thirds - in the aggregate of their earnings as compared with the men's" due in part to the fact that they did not remain employed as long before departing for domestic pursuits.

In stark contrast, the American Watch Co. proudly noted in 1885 that "women get the same wages as men for doing the same kind and amount of work" [American Watch Co., souvenir catalog for the 1884-85 New Orleans Exposition]. I do not know if Elgin had become more progressive in the intervening dozen years.

That's a nice piece of horological history Jerry. I think the instance of "equal pay for equal work" you found was exceptionally enlightened for those times and certainly not typical across American industry.

One of the rationalizations for such pay inequity I have seen many times in my historical readings was based on the societal norms prevailing in 19th and early 20th Century America:

1. It was taken for granted that any woman in the workforce was single, so she supposedly didn't "need" as much compensation as a man, who was presumed to be supporting a family. Never mind that she might be a widow with children to support, or taking care of aging parents!

2. It was unheard of for a married woman to have a job outside the home, and in fact there were laws prohibiting such in many fields of endeavor. She was supposed to be supported by her husband and her "job" was being homemaker.

I have experience with the later phenomenon in my own family as late as the 1940's. After my parents were married in 1942 and my dad went off to war, my mother was dismissed from her job as a high school teacher of English and Latin, because by law, married women were not allowed to be teachers in Maine at that time.

Given these historical precedents, many people incorrectly assume that women still are being paid less for doing the same work, especially when they hear frequently bandied-about statistics showing that women earn significantly less then men.

As an employment lawyer, I can assure you that it has been unlawful for decades to pay women less than men for doing the same work, and violations of this law (the Equal Pay Act) are extremely rare.

The pay disparity between women and men today is almost entirely explainable by factors other than discrimination (in the normal sense), such as unequal pay for the same work. It is almost entirely explainable by career choices and family responsibilities. To cite one obvious cause, a woman who takes off years in the prime of her working career to raise a family is unlikely to be as successful as an otherwise identical male peer who does not take that time off.

I would be the last person to approve of discrimination, but we should not see discrimination where none exists.

I posted this topic on the green board as well, and Andy Dervan pointed out that although men and women at Waltham may have gotten the same pay for the same work, men may have held more of the higher-paying jobs in the factory. This factor (pay-rate for a particular task) may explain part of the disparity at Elgin as well. I also sensed that the average pay was higher for men at Elgin because they might have had more time and experience in any particular position.

I would like to amplify on the point just made. The often seen workplace photographs of the Waltham factory suggest that most if not all departments were segregated by gender. Thus, Waltham management's boast of "equal pay for equal work" probably meant much less than it suggested. In watch factories female workers were considered better suited for certain repetitive jobs that required a relatively high degree of manual dexterity, and they may actually have been. (If nothing else, women have smaller hands, on average, than men, which can be advantageous for tasks involving fine motor control and hand-eye coordination). Nevertheless, the most skilled and highest paying jobs of that nature - springing and adjusting - appear to have been reserved at Waltham, as elsewhere, exclusively for men. Clearly then, gender segregation in the workplace had no real basis in inate ability but rather profited management by effectively reducing labor costs. Gender segregation limited employment opportunities for both women and men, and also depressed wages, at least in the departments staffed by women. Management's interests were abetted in this practice by the conventional mores of the period which frowned on mixing of the sexes in the workplace.

While Waltham's labor policies appear to have been very progressive for their time (see for example, Tom McIntyre's essay in the 2002 seminar book), by modern standards the same policies, especially as regards female employees, might be considered insufferably paternalistic. Nevertheless, 19th century labor practices ought to be viewed in their historical context. Even if Waltham's egalitarian boast may have fallen far short of reality, compare their proclaimed 19th Century management "ideal" with the advice given in a 1960s era Westinghouse Electric Corporation management guide, which expressedly advised managers that women should be paid less for the same work than men! The Westinghouse guide justified this practice on the grounds that female workers allegedly required more expensive accommodations than their male counterparts. One can only guess what those supposedly more expensive accomodations included. Sofas in the rest rooms? Clean toilets?

Those interested in the human factors of 19th Century American watch production should find Professor Kenneth DeLucca's talk at the upcoming Seminar in Cleveland of special interest.

Clint Geller