Note 249 — Chapter XII · ToC

Women sometimes abuse the superior competitive powers contained in their lower standard of subsistence, and the smaller number of those dependent on them, to undersell male labour. In Sheffield file-making, where women are paid the same list of prices as men, it is said that they practise sweating in their homes to the detriment of male workers. So in carpet-weaving at Halifax; recently when the men struck against a reduction upon their wage of 35s., women took the work at 20s. (Lady Dilke, "Industrial Position of Women," Nineteenth Century, Oct. 1893.) In watch-making, "the hand-work for which men were paid about 18s. a-week is now done by women with machinery for about 12s." (Report to Labour Commission on Women's Employments, p. 146.)