21.04.2019

Western Europe and the United States in the 19th century. Child slave labor in tsarist russia

Today's topic will be extremely interesting and indicative. Firstly, you will find out why child labor and women's labor was in great demand in the Russian Empire and the use of such labor only grew, and secondly, you will find out how much those who worked in production in the Russian Empire and in European countries earned, and how it affected their well-being, and thirdly, you will learn about how prices rose in relation to the growth of wages, whether the working person became more prosperous, or, on the contrary, became poorer ...

The source of today's material is N.A. Rubakin "Russia in Figures" (St. Petersburg, 1912).

The table below allows you to visually see how male, female and child labor is distributed in some industries. This table refers to 1900 and includes more than one and a half million workers, of which 80 thousand worked on the side:

Out of every thousand workers:

1. Metal processing: men - 972, women - 28, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 11 children.

2. Processing of nutrients: men - 904, women - 96, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 14 children.

3. Wood processing: men - 898, women - 102, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 12 children.

4. Processing of minerals (especially glass production): men - 873, women - 127, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 63 children.

5. Processing of animal products: men - 839, women - 161, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 17 children.

6. Treatment of chemicals: men - 804, women - 196, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 2 children.

7. Paper processing: men - 743, women - 257, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 58 children.

8. Processing of fibrous substances: men - 554, women - 446, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 27 children.

9. Oil refineries: men - 995, women - 5, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 4 children.

10. Distilleries: men - 986, women - 14, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 4 children.

11. Fruit, grape, vodka: men - 937, women - 63, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 40 children.

12. Breweries: 914 for men, 86 for women, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 15 children.

13. Sugar beet: men - 876, women - 124, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 17 children.

14. Vodka: men - 570, women - 430, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 23 children.

15. Match factories: men - 518, women - 482, incl. juveniles of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 141 children.

16. Tobacco: men - 322, women - 678, incl. minors of both sexes (12-15 years old) - 69 children.

“There is hardly any need to prove that the owners of industrial enterprises are trying in every possible way, where possible, to replace men's labor with women's and children's labor, as with cheaper ones, and any economic disasters that befall the country will undoubtedly increase the supply of women's and children's labor, which means they will also to a fall in wages. The same phenomenon is facilitated by politics, which is overly supportive of the owners. Every year women and child labor find more and more use for themselves, which could not be otherwise with the support that the owners of factories and factories find in the government. This growth of female labor and child labor, and an ever greater and greater replacement of male labor by them, can be seen from the following table:

Out of every 1000 workers, there were:

Women:

In tobacco factories: in 1895. - 647 people, in 1904. - 678 people

In match factories: in 1895 - 451 people, in 1904. - 482 people

In breweries: in 1895 - 24 people, in 1904. - 86 people

Children:

In tobacco factories: in 1895. - 91 people, in 1904. - 69 people

In match factories: in 1895 - 105 people, in 1904. - 141 people

In breweries: in 1895 - 4 people, in 1904. - 14 people

This shows that the use of female labor has increased in all three industries mentioned above, and the labor of children has increased in match factories and breweries. Interestingly, even among minors, girls are gradually replacing boys, because and here their labor is paid cheaper than the labor of these latter. For example, in 1895. in match factories for every thousand young workers there were 426 girls and 574 boys, and in 1904. there are already 449 girls and 551 boys. The number of female workers in tobacco factories increased even more over the same period of time (from 511 to 648 in every thousand). Female workers also appeared in sugar factories, where they had never existed before (from 0 to 26 for every thousand). These figures speak for themselves "

Now let’s assess how workers in the Russian Empire were paid for labor in general and child labor in particular.

Take the average laborer. According to the 1904 Washington Bureau of Labor, the average monthly wage of a laborer was:

In the United States - 71 rubles. (at 56 working hours per week);

In England - 41 rubles. (at 52.5 working hours per week);

In Germany - 31 rubles. (at 56 working hours per week);

In France - 43 rubles. (at 60 working hours per week);

In Russia - from 10 rubles. up to 25 rubles. (at 60-65 working hours per week).

Even more clearly visible is the huge difference in the size of the average wage in Russia and abroad from the following table of Dr. E. Dementyev, who compares in it the average monthly earnings in the Moscow province, in England and in America in rubles (for all industries without exception) :

a) Moscow province .: man. - 14.16 rubles, women - 10.35 rubles, teenager - 7.27 rubles, youngster - 5.08 rubles.

b) England: man. - RUB 21.12, women - 18.59 rubles, teenager - 13.32 rubles, youngster - 4.33 rubles.

b) Massachusetts: men. - RUB 65.46, women - 33.62 rubles, teenager - 28.15 rubles, youngster - 21.04 rubles.

This information refers to the 80s, but this does not diminish their comparative value, because wages rose in England, America and Russia from 1880 to 1912, and in a proportion even less favorable for the Russian worker. As you know, under the pressure of economic and other troubles, forcing the population to work and for meager wages, the wages of Russian workers, deprived of almost any opportunity to fight by peaceful means for their increase, show a relatively small tendency to increase. The prices of labor in England and America are growing from year to year. Thus, the already significant difference in earnings noted by E. Dementyev has now become even more significant.

"Wages, as E. Dementyev stated at one time, both in individual industries and in average values for all, without distinction, industries in England, and especially in America, are twice, three times, even five times higher." The monthly output of each worker, regardless of sex and age, is, on average, higher than ours: in England - 2.25 times, in America - 4.8 times. Expressing it in rubles we find:

Monthly earnings in:

Moscow province. - 11 rubles. 89 kopecks.

England - 26 rubles. 64 kopecks, i.e. higher than Russian by 124, 05% (!!!)

Massachusetts - 56 rubles. 97 kopecks. those. higher than Russian by 379, 14% (!!!)

In England, men receive 2.8 times more than ours, women 1.1 times, adolescents 1.2 times. In Massachusetts, men receive 4 times more than ours, women 2.5 times, and adolescents 3.2 times.

The most recent data give the following comparative table of average wages for workers in the three categories of mechanical production, if we take the wages of English workers for 100:

Locksmith and turner:

England - 100, Germany - 90.6, Belgium - 67.3, St. Petersburg - 61.5

Laborer:

England - 100, Germany - 100, Belgium - 73.0, St. Petersburg - 50.2

The average budget of a working family in our country and abroad (in rubles):

England - 936 UAH;

United States - UAH 1300;

Germany - 707 UAH;

European Russia - 350 UAH;

St. Petersburg - 440 UAH

But a comparison of wages in terms of their absolute size still says little about the position of the Russian worker. To make the picture clearer, it is necessary to compare wages and their changes over time, with the prices of the main commodities and with the fluctuations in these prices.

Factory inspectors have collected data covering about 1,200,000 workers. According to these data, the annual wages of workers changed over the years 1900-1909. in the following way:

1900 - 194 rubles;

1901 - 202.9 rubles;

1902 - 202.4 rubles;

1903 - 217 rubles;

1904 - 213.9 rubles;

1905 - 205.5 rubles;

1906 - 231.68 rubles;

1907 - 241.4 rubles;

1908 - 244.7 rubles;

1909 - 238.6 rubles.

Salary for 1990-1909 grew by 23%. As if it turns out that the situation has changed for the workers during this time for the better. But it is not so.

Let's pay attention, first of all, to those groups of goods, which include food items. In this case, it turns out that:

- bread products increased in 1900-1909. by 36.1%;

- animal products increased in 1900-1909. by 30%;

- oilseed products increased in 1900-1909. by 21.2%.

Over the same years, the grocery group increased by 1.5%, and the spinning group (garments) - by 11.3%.

The above data shows the increase in WHOLESALE prices! Retail prices have gone up even more!

For comparison:

- in England retail (!) Prices for 23 edible products for 1900-1908. increased by 8.4%;

- in the S.-States, the wholesale prices for food supplies for the years 1900-1908. increased by 19%;

- in Germany, prices increased between 1900-1908. by 11%.

(Finn-Enotaevsky, Quoted works, pp. 380-381)

The above table for the wages of Russian workers 1900-1909. states one very interesting fact. The fact is that the increase in wage rates took place mainly in 1905-1907. The table shows that the annual wages in 1905 are lower than in 1904 and 1903. Why is this so? This is explained by the fact that in 1905, as a result of strikes alone, workers lost 23 million 600 thousand working days.

In addition, due to the closure of many factories, there have been massive layoffs of workers. There was also a general industrial crisis.

In 1906 the number of strikes decreased, but the workers still lost 5 million 500 thousand working days this year. In 1907, even fewer days were lost - only 2 million 400 thousand. Thanks to this, in 1906-1907. average annual earnings show an increase. But in these 2 years lockouts were already in use, and they did not pay for the strike days, especially in 1907. In addition, in the second half of 1907, a turn began, and the scales tipped to the side of the entrepreneurs. The result was that while the wages for 1904-1907. increased by 12.9%, all goods increased by 18.7%, bread products - by 37.2%, animals by 21.9%, spinning products by 9.2%, and only grocery products decreased by 1.4% ...

But the very horror of proletarian existence is especially vividly illustrated by that unemployment, in which a person who is efficient, vigorous, strong and strong, turns out and feels unnecessary to anyone and nothing, and seems to lose his right to exist, turns, apart from his own will and desire, into an unproductive parasite ...

It hardly needs to be proved, and it is hardly possible to prove with general figures that somewhere right there, near us, every day, every second, many thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people are in such an "unemployed state", and every crisis, general or private, increases their number, sometimes to enormous proportions.

Such crises were, for example, in 1900-1902, in 1903 they somewhat smoothed out, in 1904 they worsened again. Close to crises, lockouts, closings of factories, and general layoffs should be put, the size of which can be judged, for example, by the fact that in 1905, in capitals alone, more than 170 thousand people were dismissed and transferred to the state of unemployed and unnecessary. Unemployment especially increased in 1906 after the Moscow uprising, when there were tens of thousands of unemployed in all large cities:

- in Odessa - 12 thousand 375 people;

- in Lodz - 18 thousand people;

- in Tula - 10 thousand people;

- in Poltava - 1 thousand people;

- in Rostov-on-Don - 5 thousand people;

- in Moscow at one Khitrov market - 10 thousand people;

- in St. Petersburg - 55 thousand people.

In 1907-1911. their number was no less, and even more, in many places. At present, with the influx of landless and starving peasants into the cities, the number of unemployed is immeasurably higher. Unemployment undoubtedly finds its clearest expression in the statistics of suicide among the working population. So, for example, in St. Petersburg alone in 1904, the City Council ascertained 115 cases of suicide from unemployment, in 1905 - 94, in 1906 - 190, in 1907 - 310. this figure, with little hesitation, kept going and going uphill, as if proving that a real proletarian who has fought off the ground has no other way out in the modern way of life, except for the grave ... "

In Russia law June 1, 1882... banned children from working up to 12 years old, for children 12-15 years old, he limited the working time to 8 hours a day (moreover, no more than 4 hours without a break) and prohibited night (from 9 pm to 5 am) and Sunday work, and also prohibited the use of child labor in hazardous industries.
Business owners were supposed to "provide an opportunity" for children who did not have a certificate of graduation from at least one-class public school or an educational institution equivalent to it, to attend school for at least 3 hours a day or 18 hours a week.

The introduction of the law immediately provoked opposition from industrialists.

Chelyabinsk. Tea-packing factory of Vysotsky.

Lozhkarny production. Handicrafts of Russia 1910s

Joiner's production. Handicrafts of Russia 1910s

Wooden tube production. Handicrafts of Russia 1910s

Staining wooden dishes. Handicrafts of Russia 1910s

Workers and women workers of the Albert Hübner's Print Manufactory Partnership

At first, a clause was introduced that its operation would be limited to factories only.
Then it was postponed for a year (until May 1, 1884). Moreover, for another two years, with the permission of the Minister of Finance, children of 10-12 years old and night work (no more than 4 hours) for children of 12-15 years old were allowed "if necessary".

Hanging tea in the Moscow retail distribution company "Gubkin and Kuznetsov"

In 1885, the law "On the prohibition of night work by minors and women in factories, plants and manufactories" was adopted. It prohibited night work of teenagers under 17 and women in cotton, linen and woolen factories. Entered into force on October 1, 1885.

However, it was spread only for harmful work in porcelain and match production.
In 1897, the law was also extended for all textile production.

Shop of the Nikolskaya Manufactory. The small town Nikolskoye, Vladimir province, Early. XX century

Horn production. Handicrafts of Russia 1910s

From the book: Kurskaya A.S. Manufacture of watches in Moscow and the Moscow province. M., 1914

Laws of 1882 and 1885 interim rules were important with subsequent revision.

But in 1890 a bill introduced in 1890 already weakened the significance of the original laws.
Young workers from now on they could, “when it turns out to be necessary due to the nature of the production,” engage in work 9 hours in two shifts of 4.5 hours. In glass production, it was even allowed to put minors for 6 hours of night work.
The legally defined night time in certain cases was reduced to the interval from 10 pm to 4 am. This law ("On amending the regulations on the work of minors, adolescents and women in factories, plants and manufactories and on the extension of the rules on the work and training of minors in craft establishments") was adopted by the State Council and approved by the highest on April 24, 1890.

Workers in the yard of the Sytin ID & Co partnership in Moscow on Pyatnitskaya Street, 1910s

Rollers of the Association of the Calico Manufactory of Albert Hübner 1884

In reality, children continued to be exploited, and if inspections were carried out in large cities, then in the hinterland, child labor and child powerlessness existed until 1917, until the first labor code was adopted, which guaranteed an 8-hour working day and prohibits the use of children for works under 16 years old.

The village of Verkhovye, Soligalichsky district. 1910-1914. from Tatyana Drozdova's album

In Russia, even in the second half of the twentieth century, from the villagers of Karelia one could hear stories about how local merchants, in addition to firewood, hay, game, supplied live goods to St. Petersburg. They collected young children from the poor, burdened with large families, and took them to the capital, where child labor was in wide demand.
The sale of children, the purchase and delivery of cheap labor to St. Petersburg became the specialization of individual peasant industrialists, who in everyday life were called "cabbies" or "ranks".
Boys were usually asked to be placed in shops, and girls in fancy workshops. The parents supplied the child with clothes and provisions for the journey, while the passports were handed over to the industrialist. From the moment they were taken away, the fate of the children depended entirely on chance and, above all, on the industrial driver. The "cabman" was not paid for the transportation, he received money from the person to whom he gave the child to study.
For each child who was put in training for 4-5 years, the "cabman" received from 5 to 10 rubles. With an increase in the duration of training, the price increased. It was 3-4 times higher than the amount given by the buyer to the parents, and largely depended on the external data, the state of health and efficiency of the young worker. The shopkeeper or the owner of the workshop issued a residence permit for the child, provided him with clothing and food, receiving in return the right to dispose of him sovereignly.

Child labor protection was legally extended only to large-scale production, where the supervision of the implementation of laws was carried out by the factory inspection. Crafts and trade establishments were outside this sphere. The age of entry into apprenticeship was not stipulated by law. In practice, the restrictions on the duration of the working day for students established by the "Charter on Industry" were usually not observed - from 6 am to 6 pm, and even more so, the edification of the masters: not to punish and take due time with science, without forcing them to do housework and work. " The living conditions in which the teenagers found themselves pushed them to commit crimes. A third of all juvenile delinquency at the beginning of the 20th century (and these were mainly thefts caused by malnutrition) were accounted for by apprentices in craft workshops..
(, the old one does not work)
***

The manufacturer and workers. Yuryevets, Kostroma province. (now Ivanovo region),
1894-1917 from Pavel Maslakov's album

In 1894, the factory of the Kukhterin brothers, famous and successful Tomsk merchants, was launched.
The working class immediately queued up for the new factory - Parents considered it a great happiness even to attach children here to stuff boxes, although ... child labor was officially prohibited here
The Kukhterins' factory employed about 400 workers: men, women and children. Many children started working at the age of 7-8.
The children were stuffing boxes with matches. It was necessary to stuff it so that not a single match fell. A fine was paid for each fallen match, a fine of 15 kopecks was paid for a bad attitude towards machines, machine tools, tools. up to 1 rub. At that time, a box of matches cost 9 kopecks, the same as one egg. We worked for 12-14 hours with a break for lunch and tea / afternoon tea /.
The norm for children is 400 boxes.
*** http: //ann-vas1.narod.ru/Artikle/s-istori.html

From archival sources it is known that in the spring, with the beginning of snow melting, the Simsk workers they took children between the ages of 12 and 16 and sent them to the Bakal mines. There they were housed in barracks and forced to crush ore. Each child was given a lesson - to crush and bring to the warehouse 50 poods per day and they received only 3 kopecks. in a day.
*** http: //unilib.chel.su: 6005 / el_izdan / kalend2009 / sim.htm

Workers at the Tetyukhe mine, Primorsky Krai, 1910 from Elena Malinina's album

But what were the Pitkäranta mines in the sixties and seventies of the 19th century? Here is how the first hydrographer of Ladoga, colonel of the corps of naval navigators A.P. Andreev writes about this in his work "Lake Ladoga":
"In the whole mine, not only songs, but even voices are not heard: the hammer is somehow deaf, everything is deathly grave! ... There are planks, logs, pieces of ore lying under your feet - the situation is unenviable! .. there is a building near this mine wheremany boys break the ore taken out of the mine into small pieces and sort it ... "
http://pitkaranta.onego.ru/index.php?mod=plant
***

Teenager - Ural miner, Perm province, 1900 from Valery Moskalkov's album:

This picture of the crushers was taken at a mine in Pennsylvania, but conditions at the Pitkyaranta mine were hardly better.

A bottle plant for one glass furnace was built in 1898, 4 kilometers from the village of Sultanovsky on the banks of the Kuma River ... By 1906, the plant already employed 250 people ...
Here is what the first glass-blower of the plant, Vasily Arestovich Martynenko, said: “The main figure at the plant is the glass-blower. He will dip a heavy half-meter metal tube in the bath, wind a lump of molten glass around it and run to the machine, blow out the bottle and hand it over to the beater, while he himself runs in his wooden-soled shoes for a new portion of glass. The heat was unbearable, but then there were no fans, no air purification mechanisms.
Ancillary workers were in the same conditions: turners, choppers, mold greasers and otters. Their work is even more monotonous and tedious. "
We worked 12 hours a shift. A team of 8 people could produce an average of 1200 bottles per shift under such conditions and received 60 kopecks for every hundred dishes accepted by the receiver. The money was distributed among the brigade. The glassblower received 2 rubles per shift. 60 kopecks, and the subsidiary is much less: turner - 24 kopecks, relative - 18 kopecks.
Children from 8 to 9 years old were used for ancillary work. Therefore, the owner gladly hired large families to use cheap child labor.
*** http: //www.smga.ru/minvody_dorevolucionnoe_vremya.htm

Internal view of the guta (glass-blowing shop) of the Bakhmetyevs Nikolsky Crystal Factory Penza lips. XIX century. (?)

The census of Irkutsk in 1864 recorded the use of child labor - 23% of children under 14 had any occupation: 0.1% were employed in public service (they were scribes); 1.5% in trade (traded or consisted of merchant clerks, office clerks); 3.3% were engaged in various crafts (most of all there were tailors, shoemakers, joiners, carpenters, cigarette makers, furriers, painters, but there were also butchers, bricklayers, stove-makers, spinners, etc.); domestic servants, day laborers and laborers accounted for 8.3% of adolescents under 14 years of age; and most of all - 9.8% were engaged in household work, gardening, etc. Most of the children who started their labor activity early were unhappy. Many owners of shops and workshops in large and provincial cities did not want to stop working even on holidays, apparently not wanting to lose profits, while most of their apprentices were minors, who thus were deprived of not only rest, but also the opportunity to study or to dispose of their own leisure on weekends and holidays.

*** http: //new.hist.asu.ru/biblio/gorsib2_1/128-135.html

Builders of railway bridges on the Trans-Siberian Railway near Krasnoyarsk. Krasnoyarsk, 1906.from the album of Alexander Oshurko

Glukhov's spinner or weaver could be recognized among the crowd by his green, earthy face.
The machines and machines in the workshops were so closely spaced that it was possible to wade between them only sideways, with danger to life. Saving on everything, trying to squeeze out more profit from everything, Morozov used every piece of the area to his advantage. The moving parts of the machines - gears, belt drives, transmissions - were not fenced in the same way out of economy, and in factories, because of this, accidents happened every day. Either a worker, while cleaning, gets into the machine with his hand, then he gets caught by a torn shirt on the gear wheel, then he will be tightened with a belt under the transmission shaft. Children suffered the most. Accidents happened to them most often; children were less careful, more mobile, and more tired at work than adults. It is clear from the statistics that in 1882, 67 percent of all accidents at the Bogorodsko-Glukhovskaya manufactory occurred with children.
Small, thin children, of whom many were not even eight years old, were forced to carry heavy bales of cotton, baskets of yarn, boxes of spools. Miserable, tattered, barely keeping their feet from fatigue, they wiped off cars, swept floors, and stoked stoves. They were peddlers, messengers, weaving apprentices. They struggled to earn their living on a full-time basis. The calculation was made with them in a very simple way.
the principle: how many baskets or bales each of them will bring - and there were no more than a dozen per each - that is how many kopecks they will receive.
*** http://www.bogorodsk-noginsk.ru/narodnoe/gluhovo20/1.html

Let their Russia remains their Russia there, abroad. Let them sell their children into slavery. There on their homeland.
= =
See also " "

Humanitarian University of Trade Unions

Faculty of Conflictology

abstract
on the discipline "Trade union movement"

"Child labour"

Completed by: 1st year student
Faculty of Conflictology
1st group
Andreeva Daria Andreevna (1)

Teacher: Loboc. D.V.

Saint Petersburg
2013 g.
Introduction

Child labor remains a serious problem in today's world. According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), 215 million working children around the world are engaged in work that hinders their development and education, as well as deprives them of their future livelihood; many are involved in the worst forms of child labor that cause irreversible physical or psychological harm, or even threaten their lives.
Child labor is a problem throughout the world, in both industrialized and developing countries. Experience has shown that child labor causes serious, sometimes irreparable harm to the physical and psychosocial development of the child. Mostly children from the most vulnerable social strata, from low-income families or single-parent families, both in rural areas and in the city, are involved in difficult labor that is not their age. These children are forced to work in dangerous, harmful conditions to generate any income. Moreover, they have limited access to education, health services and sources of income. A vicious circle arises: the involvement of children in work worsens their prospects in terms of obtaining an education, which in turn affects further employment. Ultimately, child labor has a negative impact on human resource development and the overall socio-economic development of a country.
Child labor is found in almost all production and non-production spheres of the economy, it is used in the urban informal economy, in agriculture, small trade in local markets, and also in households. In bazaars, for example, minors are employed, mainly in sorting fruits and vegetables, loading operations (the so-called adolescents - "trolleys"), and in rare cases, young minors can be exploited as "beggars".
In addition, according to the International Labor Organization, there has been an increase in the involvement of children in commercial sexual services (selling or offering a child for the purpose of prostitution, pornography or for the production of pornographic materials) and the activities of criminal groups (using, selling or offering a child to engage him in illegal activities, especially production and drug trafficking).

1. What is child labor
Concept
Child labor is any work that, due to its conditions or circumstances of its performance, is harmful to the health, physical, mental or moral development of a child, or hinders the acquisition of education.
Child labor includes both paid and unpaid work and activities that are mentally, physically, socially or morally dangerous or harmful.
Child labor refers to work that is harmful and dangerous for the child and is prohibited by international and national laws. This is the kind of work that deprives children of the opportunity to study at school, or forces them, in addition to school activities and household chores, to load themselves with additional work performed in other places, work that enslaves them and tears them away from the family.
It is necessary to clarify what is not included in the concept of "child labor". It is generally considered positive for children and adolescents to perform work that does not affect their health and development and does not interfere with their education. These types of work include helping a child with his parents around the house or in the family business, earning pocket money after school or during school holidays. All this contributes to the development of the child and the well-being of the family, helps the child to acquire the skills and experience that will be required in the future in order to become a full-fledged member of society.
These activities are not included in the concept of "child labor". Child labor refers to types of work and activities that:
- are mentally, physically, socially or morally associated with danger to children or harm to children; and
- deprive children of the opportunity to study at school due to the fact that:
- they are unable to go to school;
- they are forced to combine schooling with hard and long work.
In its extreme forms, child labor is the enslavement of children, separating them from their families, threatening their life and health, and / or being forced to lead an independent life on the streets of large cities, and often from a very early age.
"Child labor" is work that deprives children of childhood, human dignity, the opportunity to develop their potential and harms their physical and mental development.
It is very important to provide children with a dignified childhood and help them get decent work in the future, that is, work that benefits society and helps a person maintain a dignified existence. The involvement of children in work that destroys their self-esteem, adversely affects their health, morals and deprives them of the opportunity to receive an education, seriously undermines the economic viability of society and the long-term prospects for its development.
Child labor must be seen not only as a cause, but also as a consequence of poverty and underdevelopment. Children involved in the worst forms of child labor and without even a basic education are likely to become illiterate, physically and intellectually handicapped adults with little or no escape from the poverty they were born into and unable to contribute to. development of society as a whole. Just like they themselves, their children will have very little chance of further development. In today's competitive world, the prosperity of any state fundamentally depends on the quality of its human resources; tolerance of the worst forms of child labor prevents significant investment in human capital, which is a challenge for any society thinking about its future.
Even if short-term economic benefits could be obtained from the use of child labor, they must be evaluated against the background of the long-term losses in the development of the nation that these benefits will entail.

Worst Forms of Child Labor (WFCL)

All forms of slavery or practices similar to slavery:
- sale and sale of children;
- debt bondage and serfdom;
- forced or compulsory labor;
- forced or compulsory recruitment of children for use in armed conflicts;
- using, recruiting or offering children for prostitution;
- production of pornographic pictures;
- participation in pornographic performances;
- using, recruiting or offering children to engage in illegal activities
- for the production and sale of drugs.

Work that, by its nature or the conditions in which it is performed, is likely to harm the health, safety or morals of children.

NFDT DOES NOT INCLUDE:
- performance by children and adolescents of work that does not affect their health and development, and also do not interfere with their education;
- helping the child to parents around the house or in family business;
- earning pocket money after school or during school holidays in ways and methods that:
- will not harm physical or mental health;
- not related to illegal actions;
- not taking up a long time during the day;
- not associated with danger to life and health, moral foundations;
- vocational guidance and work training at school, lyceum and college, college, practice at an enterprise or in an organization in order to acquire professional skills - all this contributes to the development of the child and the well-being of the family, helps the child to acquire the skills and experience that will be required in the future in order to to become a full-fledged member of society.

Causes of child labor

Children work because their own survival and the survival of their families depend on it, and often also because unscrupulous adults take advantage of their weakness and insecurity for their own purposes. Child labor is also associated with underdeveloped public education systems and is rooted in cultural and social attitudes and traditions.
Poverty is by far the main reason children work. The income received from the child's work turns out to be the most important factor in the survival of the child himself or his family.
Widespread opinions, as well as local traditions and customs (even if they are based on good intentions) also play an important role. For instance:
the belief that work has a beneficial effect on the formation of the character and development of skills in children;
the tradition of continuity, that is, the inheritance of the profession of their parents by children, and in such cases, children are forced to learn this profession at an early age and to put into practice the acquired knowledge and skills;
traditions that push poor families to borrow large sums of money to organize holidays and religious services and rely on the labor of their children to pay back such debts. The phenomenon of serf labor, recognized as one of the worst forms of child labor, remains widespread, mainly due to the vulnerability of poor families to such social pressures;
there is a widespread belief that girls are less in need of education than boys, which leads to being taken out of school at an early age and forced to do housework or sold into services or sex establishments.
child labor can be so deeply rooted in local traditions and customs that neither parents nor the children themselves realize that child labor is contrary to the interests of the children themselves and is illegal;
children from large families are more likely to find themselves at work than children from small families, since their parents' income is insufficient to support a large family.
The availability and quality of schooling are among the most important factors:
many communities lack the necessary conditions for the provision of schooling;
even where schools exist, education is often not viewed by children or their parents as a viable alternative to work. Many families simply cannot afford to send their children to school. Even if school is free, the family bears the cost of lost earnings as the child goes to school and not to work;
the education provided in schools is often of poor quality and / or is viewed by parents and children themselves as inadequate to local needs and conditions;
it is not surprising, therefore, that school attendance is often simply considered useless;
the prevailing opinion is that a girl will be better prepared for adulthood if she works rather than studies;
as a result of the factors described above, large numbers of children enter the unskilled labor market early. They are often illiterate and remain so throughout their lives; they also lack the basic education that could help them develop the necessary skills and enable them to live and work with dignity in the future.
Families themselves are also critical. A huge number of children work for free in family businesses (on farms, in the private sector, etc.), which are completely dependent on the labor of family members. Numerous national laws and regulations, as well as international standards such as ILO Convention No. 138, allow exceptions in such cases. However, even when working in family businesses, children’s health and safety can be at serious risk.
At the same time, the definition of the problem should begin with the recognition of its complexity and versatility. Legislators and authorities should avoid simplistic explanations of the reasons for child labor.
For instance:
there is a widespread belief that nothing can be done to combat child labor - child labor is the result and manifestation of poverty and can be eradicated only after poverty itself is eradicated;
according to another established belief, child labor only exists because of unscrupulous adults who exploit children for quick profits and dishonestly earned competitive advantage. The only thing that needs to be done, according to this conviction, is to bring the perpetrators to justice and send the children back to school, where they belong.
Eliminating the worst forms of child labor as soon as possible should be based on legislation that proclaims the complete elimination of child labor as the ultimate goal of government policy and explicitly identifies and prohibits the worst forms of child labor as a priority. Such legislation should also provide for adequate sanctions against violators and appropriate compensation for victims of violations, and such legislation should be rigorously and impartially applied.
The combination of these reasons leads to the fact that even where child labor is declared illegal, it continues to exist and is perceived as a natural phenomenon, and it is usually invisible to an outside observer. Child labor is often surrounded by a wall of silence, indifference and social apathy. But this wall is already beginning to crumble. The process of globalization and the development of modern means of communication have made the suffering of working children one of the main issues on the agenda of the world community.
The ever-growing concern of the international community with the problem of child labor, expressed in various events, is the result of the following:
Trade and capital liberalization trends. Demands to prohibit the use of child labor in the struggle for a place on the world market have become louder and louder.
Greater transparency in the global economy and the abolition of associations of states after the end of the Cold War.
Refusal of consumers to buy goods, if in their production, in particular, child labor was used; and
Making public the facts of commercial sexual exploitation of children, and especially the involvement of children in prostitution, pornography and sex tourism.
This in turn led to a fuller understanding of the causes of child labor; awareness that the main reasons are poverty, lack of education or its low level, as well as socio-cultural structure and traditions. Child labor cannot be eradicated through the enactment of some kind of law. This is a goal that will take time to achieve. However, there are types of child labor that need to be dealt with immediately.
Thus, in the 1990s, it was decided that the priority for the elimination of child labor was to eradicate its worst forms, that they should be ended as soon as possible, and for this purpose agreed programs of action should be developed and implemented at the national and international levels.

Employers using child labor.

This is most often explained by the fact that compared to adults, child labor is much cheaper and, moreover, it is often argued that children are physically able to perform some types of work better than adults. Some industries, employers say, are completely dependent on child labor. Such arguments are of particular concern because the process of globalization, as well as increased competition in the world market for certain products, will further expand the scope of child labor and worsen the situation in this area. At the same time, if these arguments are accepted, globalization will increase the risk of child exploitation as their employers seek to achieve a competitive advantage in global markets. How reliable are these arguments?
The results of serious research prove that child labor is not indispensable for the development and vitality of any existing industry.
Studies in selected enterprises employing large numbers of children have raised great doubts about the validity of the argument that children are physically better equipped for certain types of work. Almost all types of work carried out by children are also successfully performed by adults. Even in hand-weaving carpets - an occupation in which child labor is considered indispensable - children were found to be no more skillful than adults, and the most elaborate carpets were woven by adult women.
Research carried out at carpet and decoration factories in India also found that, as a component of the final price of carpets or jewelry exported to the customer, the labor cost savings achieved through the use of child labor are extremely small. Manufacturers could either attribute the additional costs incurred by hiring adults only to operating theaters, or offset them by raising the price of products without jeopardizing the viability of their businesses.
If the above argument fails in industries that have traditionally relied heavily on child labor, such as carpet making, what economic justification can be found for using child labor in any other industry?
Thus, it turns out that the main reason for using child labor is not at all related to economic efficiency. Children are easier to manage than adults - although they are less skilled, they are less aware of their rights, cause less hassle, complain less, and are more adaptable - and are ultimately the easiest to sacrifice when things go wrong.
For many employers, children represent a pool of irregular workforce that can be recruited and fired at will. If the work of children is illegal, neither they themselves nor their parents are likely to complain to the authorities for fear of losing even the meager earnings that children bring to their families. In addition, some employers sincerely believe that they are providing a service to the children they have hired by giving them the opportunity to work and receive a salary. Thus, declaring child labor illegal may in some cases backfire - depriving working children of much of the protection that is provided to adults through labor laws. This further underscores the idea that simply prohibiting child labor will not bring positive results. Simple prohibitions on child labor are not successful unless accompanied by a range of other measures.

Analysis of the situation in Moscow.
The main argument in favor of child labor, according to some employers, is the fact that children begin to value money because they earn it through their labor. Children receive their own income not through begging or theft, but for their work, and this is the main thing - more than two-thirds of the surveyed employers think so (69.1%). Thus, employers say, industriousness is instilled, children are taught to work and not to mess around (45.7%). In addition, they are constantly under the supervision of adults, which is also important. The last argument is cited by a third of the surveyed employers (34.6%).
Thus, in some cases, one of the reasons for the existence of child labor is the coincidence of interests of both working children and employers. Children receive the means of subsistence they need, and the employer receives cheap labor, and in addition to this, the moral satisfaction from the fact that they were provided with help to children in need.

2. Slavery and exploitation of children in the world.

The International Labor Organization (ILO) estimates that around 250 million children aged 5 to 14 are forced to work in developing countries alone. Of these, 153 million live in Asia, 80 million in Africa and 17 million in Latin America. Many of them work in conditions that are dangerous to their physical, spiritual and emotional development.
About 120 types of goods are produced with the help of child and slave labor in the world. The victims of this industry are at least 12 million people from 59 countries. About 352 million children in the world between the ages of 5 and 17 are working. Such data are contained in the report of the International Labor Organization (ILO) "Future without child labor". According to the ILO, about 246 million children are engaged in work activities that should be excluded. Of these, about 179 million are involved in the worst forms of child labor, including slavery, prostitution and pornography, participation in armed conflicts, as well as work in mines, agriculture, and construction. According to the estimates of the Russian government, up to 1 million children work in Russia. Of these, according to the ILO, 50 thousand - in Moscow, 16 thousand - in St. Petersburg. Child prostitution in Moscow has reached a simply threatening scale: according to experts, there are more than 50 thousand children in this business, whose age ranges from 3 (!!!) to 14 years. As of 2008, child prostitution is flourishing in Dagestan.
Child prostitution is flourishing in Ukraine, and child trafficking is a gigantic problem and a harsh reality. These conclusions were made public in his report according to the results of the excursion to Ukraine in the last days of October 2006 by the UN Special Rapporteur on the issue of trafficking in children.
In Kyrgyzstan, IWPR found a network of brothels and child prostitution on the streets in 2004.
Czech authorities announced in 2001 that child prostitution existed in the Czech Republic.
Child slave labor in China. Identified in 2007 in illegal coal mines and brick factories in Shanxi province. Children get there in different ways: they are kidnapped, sold, lured by deception. They are forced to work 18-19 hours a day. The age of children is 8-13 years old.
Côte d'Ivoire is the main producer of cocoa beans in the world. Several international human rights groups have stated that child slave labor is used on the plantations. In particular, Cargill Inc. The exploitation of child labor is prohibited at Cargill - the official working age is 18. However, this law is ignored. The chocolate industry, governments and civil rights organizations have launched an international campaign to tackle the problem, but child labor continues to be exploited. Big companies like Cargill don't own plantations, so they don't officially hire workers. They just buy the cocoa beans from the workers. Yet human rights activists say companies like these are responsible for improving working conditions. Fair trade chocolates are produced without the use of slave labor.
Nike uses child slave labor.
According to the International Labor Rights Fund, Monsanto uses child labor. In India alone, cotton plantations owned by Monsanto and other multinational agricultural corporations employ more than 12,000 children. Many children have died or become seriously ill as a result of exposure to pesticides. Monsanto has annual profits of $ 5.4 billion.
Nestle - the company is accused of using child labor, violating workers' rights, aggressively promoting unhealthy products, violating health and environmental laws. It is in the production of chocolate that child labor is most often used. More than 40% of the cocoa beans grow in the Ivory Coast (Africa), according to the US Department of State, about 109 thousand children are working on cocoa plantations in this country in terrible conditions. Cocoa farms have been ranked as the worst form of child labor in the world. In 2001, Save the Children Canada reported that 15,000 children between the ages of 9 and 12 (many of them starving children from Mali) were fraudulently taken or sold into slavery for as little as $ 30 cocoa farms in West Africa. Last summer, the International Workers' Rights Fund filed a lawsuit against Nestlé and several of its suppliers on behalf of former child slaves who worked for the companies.
Child labor in Uzbekistan. Every autumn, children in Uzbekistan are forced to work in the cotton harvest for a small fee. German companies are among those that profit from this type of human rights abuses. Stadtlander aids and abets in human rights abuses. Stadtlander's good relations with Uzbekistan are fully in line with the policy of the German government. A "New Partnership" connects Germany with President Karimov, and German soldiers are sent to Afghanistan from a German military base in Uzbekistan. German banks also profit from the cotton trade. One of these is the partially state-owned Commerzbank, which has an office in Tashkent. The bank has been involved in financing cotton deals for European clients in Uzbekistan "for many years." Deutsche Bank is also funding agreements with Uzbekistan. Distributors like C&A and Wal-Mart are currently trying not to deal with clothing that contains cotton from Uzbekistan. But it is difficult to trace the path of Uzbek cotton, which dealers mix with cotton from other countries. In 2010, the British Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) released a report on the widespread use of forced child labor in Uzbekistan, entitled "Slave Nation". The cotton industry of Uzbekistan, according to the EJF expert, is a modern form of slavery, the scale of which cannot be compared even with what is happening in other closed and repressive countries of the world similar to Uzbekistan.
In Kazakhstan, schoolchildren are illegally forced to pick cotton instead of studying. For child labor, adults pay pennies, absolutely not caring about their safety.

Problems causing child exploitation include:

Changes in the system of values in society (priority of money and material values);
Problems in the education system (lack of funding, reduced control over school attendance, reduced availability of education);
Lack of children's state children's organizations and institutions (pioneers, scout movement);
Reducing state control over the implementation of laws on the prohibition of child labor and the protection of children;
An economic imperative forcing vulnerable families to use child labor.
Many children are involved in the worst forms of child labor because they are unable to receive a quality education. Thus, the very absence of alternatives to the worst forms of child labor is at the root of child labor.
The traditional distribution of gender roles leads to the fact that girls often do not have the opportunity to get an education. Such girls are especially at risk of being included in the ranks of children in child labor. Finally, the erosion of traditional social fabrics that protected children is also one of the factors that drive children to seek employment in the struggle to survive.
As a rule, the causes of child labor are largely associated with socio-economic problems in the countryside and in agriculture. In addition, the specifics of the industry - the widespread use of manual and low-skilled labor - makes it possible to use the labor of children.
Some employers find it beneficial to use child labor. Children are hired in the face of high adult unemployment as a cheaper and more obedient labor force. Underdeveloped labor markets also make it profitable for parents who own land to use their children as free labor.

3. International Program for the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC)

The International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor (IPEC) was founded in 1992 to coordinate the ILO's efforts to combat child labor. The German government became the first sponsor of this program, which initially involved six states. Today, IPEC supports the implementation of the program in more than 80 countries, and works in several areas, namely:
implements programs in various countries aimed at implementing reforms and taking concrete measures to eliminate child labor;
conducts international and national campaigns aimed at changing public opinion and persuading the need to ratify and implement ILO Conventions;
conducts in-depth research, legal expertise, strategy development and evaluation of programs carried out in this area at the regional and international levels.
Political will
etc.................

In the Russian and Karelian volosts at the end of the 19th century, the game “Cat, cat, sell the child” was popular: “The players imagine that they each have a child, and often they even invite small children and sit them in front of them. They usually sit in a circle ... "The driver addresses one of the couples with the words:" Kitty, kitty, sell the child! " In case of refusal, they answer him: "Go over the river, buy some tobacco!" If the player agrees and says: "Sell", he should immediately run in a circle in one direction, and the questioner - in the other. Whoever comes running to the "sold" one earlier - he sits down, and the latecomer starts to "buy" again 1. It was not just child's play in the late 19th - early 20th centuries, in fact, people were buying and selling.
Even in the second half of the twentieth century from the villagers of Karelia one could hear stories about how local merchants, in addition to firewood, hay, game, supplied live goods to St. Petersburg. They collected young children from the poor, burdened with large families, and took them to the capital, where child labor was in wide demand.
An old resident of the Karelian village of Peldozha, A. I. Barantseva (born in 1895) recalled the collision that unfolded in the Myaryan family: “They had a lot of children: Miikkul, then Nastuoy, then Anni and Mari were. All of their parents were sent to St. Petersburg, where they lived. You see, in the past, poor parents often sold their children as servants to the rich in St. Petersburg. So they sent the children of Myaryan to St. Petersburg ... "2 Traditionally, a child was considered" ready "to be sent to the city at the age of 10. But if possible, the parents preferred to postpone the boy's departure from the family until 12-13, and girls - 13-14 years old.
In the first week of Great Lent, hundreds of carts, each of which housed from three to ten children, stretched along the strong crust from the Olonets province to the capital. The Petersburg writer and journalist M. A. Krukovsky wrote a cycle of essays "Little People" based on his impressions. One of them, Senka's Adventure, depicts the story of a peasant boy who was given away by his father to Petersburg for five rubles. “Among the peasants of the Olonets Territory,” wrote Krukovsky, “in many Pronezh villages there is an unreasonable, heartless custom (my italics - O. I.) to send children to St. Petersburg and give them to small traders as the people speak ”3. The publicist was not entirely right. It was the need that forced the peasant to make a difficult decision. The family got rid of the extra mouth for a while, hoping to receive financial assistance from the "barge haulers" (as the peasants called those living and earning "on the side") in the future.
The sale of children, the purchase and delivery of cheap labor to St. Petersburg became the specialization of individual peasant industrialists, who in everyday life were called "cabbies" or "ranks". “I remember well, a certain Patroev lived in Kindasovo ... He kept recruiting children and taking them to St. Petersburg. Vasya Laurin, my brother Stepan Secon, Grisha Rodin, Maria Ivanovna ... Mari Myaryan - they were all in St. Petersburg [assistants]. Patroev took them away in a wagon, this is how children used to be sold. And then the merchants were there, the craftsmen, they forced the children to work in sewing [and other workshops], they sewed everything, ”Barantseva recalled4. In the second half of the 19th century, the delivery of children from the Olonets district to St. Petersburg was successfully carried out by the peasant Fyodor Tavlinets, who lived in the village of Pogost in the Rypushkal volost. For 20 years, he sent about 300 peasant children to the capital. There he arranged for them in craft institutions, entered into a contract with artisans for training and received a reward for the supply of apprentices. The authorities became aware of his activities when the "cabman", violating the agreement, tried to evade transferring part of the proceeds to his parents5.
Boys were usually asked to be placed in shops, and girls in fancy workshops. They supplied the child with clothes and provisions for the journey, and handed passports to the industrialist. From the moment they were taken away, the fate of the children depended entirely on chance and, above all, on the driver-industrialist. The "cabman" was not paid for the transportation, he received money from the person to whom he gave the child to study. “It is clear that under such conditions,” wrote N. Matrosov, a resident of the village of Kuzaranda, “the latter is scouring the capital and looking for a place where he will be given more money, without asking if the child is capable of this craft, whether he will live well and what will happen. subsequently ”6.
For each child who was put in training for 4-5 years, the "cabman" received from 5 to 10 rubles. With an increase in the duration of training, the price increased. It was 3-4 times higher than the amount given by the buyer to the parents, and to a large extent depended on external data, the state of health and efficiency of the young worker. The shopkeeper or the owner of the workshop issued a residence permit for the child, provided him with clothing and food, receiving in return the right to dispose of him sovereignly. In the judicial practice of that time, such a phenomenon was recorded precisely as trafficking in children. For example, the owner of one of the craft workshops explained at the trial that in St. Petersburg it is customary to buy children for schooling, as a result of which the buyer acquires the right to use the child's labor7.
The scale of trafficking in children at the end of the 19th century, according to contemporaries, acquired enormous proportions. Krukovsky painted a depressing picture that was observed when the buyer appeared in early spring: "Moans, screams, crying, sometimes - swearing is heard then on the streets of silent villages, mothers give up their sons in battle, children do not want to go to an unknown foreign land." The law recognized the need for the obligatory consent of a child who is sent to study a craft, or "into service": "Children cannot be given by parents without their own consent ..." 9. In fact, the interests of children were usually not taken into account. In order to consolidate their power over the child, buyers took an IOU from their parents.
But it was not only poverty that forced Olonets peasants to part with their children. Also influenced by the assurances that the child will be assigned "to a good place" in the city. Popular rumor kept the memory of the rich immigrants from Karelia, who managed to get rich in St. Petersburg. The stories about their capital excited the thoughts and feelings of the Karelian peasant. It is no coincidence that the proverb “Miero hinnan azuw, l’innu neidižen kohendaw” - “The world will set a price, the city will make a girl better.” According to the observations of officials, priests, teachers, every father who had several children dreamed of sending one of them to the capital.
However, not all children could quickly get used to the new living conditions in the city. The Karelian storyteller P. N. Utkin said: “They took me to St. Petersburg and assigned me to a shoemaker for five years as a boy. Well, my life started to get really bad. At four o'clock in the morning they will wake up and run errands until eleven in the evening. The hero of the story decided to run 10. Many, for various reasons, left the owners, were forced to wander. In the report of the district police officer to the Olonets governor at the end of the 19th century, it was recorded that children who were sent to study, but in fact sold to St. Petersburg, "sometimes almost half-naked in winter, arrive by different ways to their homeland" 11.
Child labor protection was legally extended only to large-scale production, where the supervision of the implementation of laws was carried out by the factory inspection. Crafts and trade establishments were outside this sphere. The age of entry into apprenticeship was not stipulated by law. In practice, the restrictions on the duration of the working day for students established by the "Charter on Industry" were usually not observed - from 6 am to 6 pm, and even more so, the edification of the masters: not to punish and take due time with science, without forcing them to do housework and work ”12. The living conditions in which the teenagers found themselves pushed them to commit crimes. One third of all juvenile delinquency at the beginning of the 20th century (and these were mainly thefts caused by malnutrition) were accounted for by apprentices in craft workshops13.
The materials of the Olonets press give an idea of the fate of the children sold in St. Petersburg. Someone, as the proverb said, Peter became a mother, and someone - a stepmother. Many of the children who found themselves in the capital soon found themselves "at the bottom" of Petersburg life. About them the inspector of public schools S. Losev wrote: “At the same time, when during Great Lent, carts with live goods are sent to St. Petersburg from Olonets province, from St. eyes, often drunk, humble when asking for alms and impudent in case of refusal, young guys and mature men who have tasted St. Petersburg "learning" in the workshops, St. Petersburg life ... "14. Among them were many who, in punishment for begging or other misdeeds, were deprived of a residence permit in the capital. Torn away from peasant labor from childhood, these people had a destructive effect on their fellow villagers. Drunkenness, previously not characteristic of the Karelians, became widespread among them in the late 19th - early 20th centuries, especially among young people and 15-16-year-olds. Those who were ashamed of their return to their native village as a loser joined the ranks of the "gold-motorists".
However, there were many young people who “stayed afloat” and adapted to city life. According to their contemporaries, of all the "values" of urban civilization, they mastered only servile manners and the so-called "jacket" culture, which consisted in the manner of dressing according to a certain pattern. The adolescents were eager to return to the village in a "city" suit that aroused the respect and respect of their peers. The appearance of a new thing did not go unnoticed by relatives and friends. It was accepted, congratulating on the new thing, to say: "Anna jumal uwdištu, tulien vuon villaštu" - "God forbid a new thing, and next year a woolen one." As a rule, the first thing a teenager bought was galoshes, which, upon returning to the village, regardless of the weather, he wore on holidays and for conversations. Then, if funds allowed, they bought lacquered boots, a watch, a jacket, a bright scarf ... Enlightened contemporaries looked at this with irony. One of them wrote: “How much arrogance and stupid swagger, unfortunately, lacquered boots bring with them. A person ceases to recognize his neighbors because of the shine of his boots. The only consolation in these cases is the fact that taking off his galoshes and boots, he becomes the same Vaska or Mishka ”15.
Unlike migrant workers for logging and other nearby trades, who earned a new shirt for Easter, boots or jacket, "Piteriaks", "Petersburgers", that is, the guys who worked for a long time in the capital, had a "smart" suit and made a an authoritative group of the village youth community. Here are the details of one of the versions of the "graceful" suit of a 13-14-year-old guy who returned to Olonets Karelia from St. Petersburg in 1908: colorful trousers, bowler hat, red gloves16. An umbrella and a scented pink handkerchief might also have been present. The status role of clothing in Karelian culture is expressed quite clearly. Apparently, that is why in the Karelian language the word “herrastua”, along with the meanings “to flaunt”, “to flaunt”, has another meaning - “to imagine oneself as a boss”.
The most successful and enterprising "pupils of Petersburg", who managed to get rich and even become the owners of their own establishments, were, of course, not numerous. Their visiting card in their homeland was a large beautiful house, in which relatives lived and where the owner came from time to time. The fame and capital of these people was a weighty argument for a peasant who sent his child to the capital.
The influence of the city on the life of a teenager in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was ambiguous. Contemporaries could not fail to note the positive impact - the intellectual development of boys and girls, the expansion of their horizons. To a greater extent, this applied to those who worked in factories or factories in St. Petersburg. Returning to the village, this small part of the youth never parted with the book.
And yet the forced sending of children to the city caused concern among the progressive section of society. A Karelian peasant V. Andreev from the village of Syamozero wrote: “Those [children. - OI], forced to live in rooms worse than dog kennels, fed by garbage and various heaps, constantly beaten by the owners and craftsmen - most of them wither, and the guest of all these workshops - fleeting consumption is carried away to the grave. The minority, who miraculously endured all these ordeals, achieved the title of a master, but, living in a drunken and depraved company for several years, they themselves became infected with these vices and prematurely went to the grave or joined the ranks of criminals. There were and are considered to be very few efficient and hard-working craftsmen. " Peasant P. Korennoy echoed him: “Dozens of people go out, hundreds die. They are strangled by city life, poisoned by the organism, spoiled morally, returning sick people to the village, with spoiled morality ”17.
Notes (edit)
1. Olonets provincial statements. 1897.10 September.
2. Barantsev A. P. Samples of Ludik's speech. Samples of the corpus of Ludik's idiolect. Petrozavodsk. 1978.S. 112.
3. Krukovsky M. A. Small people. M. 1907.S. 57.
4. Barantsev A. P. Decree. op. P. 130.
5. National Archives of the Republic of Karelia (hereinafter - NA RK). F. 1. Op. 1.D. 49/98. L. 4-5.
6. Matrosov N. The village of Kuzaranda, Petrozavodsk district // Bulletin of the Olonets provincial zemstvo (hereinafter - VOGZ). 1908. No. 20.P. 15.
7. Proceedings of the I All-Russian Congress on the fight against women's bargaining and its causes, which took place in St. Petersburg. From 21 to 25 April 1910 St. Petersburg. 1911.S. 104.
8. Krukovsky M. A. Olonets Territory. Travel sketches. SPb. 1904.S. 247.
9. Code of laws of the Russian Empire. T. Kh. Ch. 1. Art. 2202-2203.
10. Konkka U. On the collection and some features of Karelian fairy tales // Karelian folk tales. M .; L. 1963.S. 50.
11. ON RK. F. 1. Op.1. D. 49/98. L. 4-5.
12. Laws about children. Compiled by Ya.A. Kantorovich. SPb. 1899.S. 177.
13. Okunev N. A. Special court for juvenile cases: Report of the St. Petersburg capital magistrate for 1910 St. Petersburg. 1911.S. 37.
14. Cold VG Symbols and attributes of a festive costume of a guy in a Russian village from the 40s of the XIX to the 20s of the XX century. // Men's collection. Issue 1. Man in traditional culture. M. 2001.S. 136.
15. IM Glass production in the Ladvinskaya volost of the Petrozavodsk district // VOGZ. 1909. No. 13.P. 20.
16. Losev S. Sketches and notes // VOGZ. 1909. No. 2.P. 9.
17. Andreev V. To the opening of a two-class school in the Syamozero volost // VOGZ. 1908. No. 24, p. 20; P. Korennoy About our agriculture // VOGZ. 1910. No. 15, p. 33.

So, today I am posting the material that I had for a long time. It concerns the labor issue, i.e. the position of the worker in the Russian Empire. A special place is also given here to female and child labor. If you read it, be sure to pay attention to it.

There are many interesting and revealing comparisons, so you'll see for yourself.

So read on and draw your own conclusions ...