Compare and contrast the labour forces of the preindustrial and Essay

Compare and contrast the labour forces of the preindustrial and industrial ages - Essay Example For conducting the comparative analysis, the era prior to industrial revolution has been considered as pre-industrial age, whereas the period starting since industrial revolution has been considered as industrial age. Before embarking on making any comparison between the pre-industrial labour force and industrial labour force, it is necessary to look at the major features of labour market of pre-industrial age as well as that of industrial age to form a clear idea about the features of labour force during these two periods. Characteristics of labour market at any point of time can be viewed in terms of labour force composition, production process, division of labour, labour market institutions, wage structure, etc. The present paper will first discuss the major characteristics of labour market in the two periods under consideration, which are preindustrial era and industrial era. In the pre-industrial period, economies were mostly dependent on agricultural sector and to some extent on home based industries, like manufacturing, construction etc. Industrial sector did not flourish on a commercial basis largely. There existed only a few industries, which ran their business on a commercial basis, like iron or textile industries, etc. Consequently, most of the labourers were agricultural labourers or were employed in home based industries. Labourers mostly concentrated on rural areas, because during that period the notion and extent of urbanization was very limited. As far as, gender perspective in labour force participation was concerned, it was found that males mostly dominated that labour market. Female participation in the labour force was very low. In this context, one interesting thing can be mentioned that in pre-industrial era, women used to be involved in doing household activities even because most of them belonged to very poor families. In addition, mo re earning members were required to meet the daily needs of living