ed raw wool to workers who worked at home. Thus, many women could work for the merchants and perform domestic labor at the same time.
The Industrial Revolution transformed the economic system in several ways. First, it altered the composition of the workforce substantially by increasing overall productivity. Therefore, young children could complete education up to the age of 15 years old. Many women did not need to work.
More significantly, the emergence of factories eliminated traditional occupations and created new ones in their place. For example, the dominance of agriculture was reduced to 50 percent of the workforce. With the destruction of outmoded industries, new industries such as oil production and refining, came into their wake. Women were also adversely affected by these changes. Poor women could no longer produce textiles from their own homes or participate in agriculture. With the dramatic division of labor between the home and the workplace, women's jobs were usurped by men who worked in factories. In 1870,
...