ions. But in these fields women
still meet with prejudice and difficulties. In increasing numbers women
are becoming bankers, merchants, contractors, owners or managers of
factories, shareholders, stock-brokers, and commercial travelers. About
1000 women are now engaged in these occupations. As office clerks women
have stood the test well in the United States. They are esteemed for their
discretion and willingness to work. They are paid $12 to $20 a week.
According to the most recent statistics on the trades and professions
(1900) there were 1271 women bank clerks, 27,712 women bookkeepers, and
86,118 women stenographers.

In the civil service we find fewer women (they are not voters): in 1890
there were 14,692, of whom 8474 were postal, telephone, and telegraph
clerks, and 300 were police officials. In 1900, the total number of women
engaged in commerce was 503,574.

The prejudice against the women of the lower classes is still evident.
Here at the very outset there is a great difference between the wages of
men and women, the wages of the latter being from one third to one half
lower. This is caused partly by the fact that women are given the
disagreeable, tiresome, and unimportant work, which they _must_ accept,
not being given an opportunity to do the better class of work,--frequently
because they have not learned their trade thoroughly. A further cause for
the lower wages of women is that they are working for "pocket-money" and
"incidentals," and thus spoil the market for those who must pay their
whole living expenses with what they earn. Among the women workers of the
United States there are two classes,--the industrial class and the
amateurs. The latter make the existence of the former almost impossible.
Such a competition is unknown to men in industrial work. Mrs. v. Vorst[22]
proposes a solution--to make the industrial amateurs become special
artisans by means of a longer apprenticeship, thus relieving the
industrial slaves from injurious competition.

Office work and work in the factories enables the American women of the
middle and lower classes to satisfy their desire for independence; those
who are not obliged to provide for themselves wish at least to have money
at their disposal. That is a thoroughly sound aspiration. These girls
become factory employees and not domestic servants, (1) because work in
their own home is not paid for (the general disregard of housework drives
the women striving for indepen