In laundry-work, which includes several divisions, wages weekly range from $7.50 to $10, though ironers of special excellence sometimes make from $12 to $15 per week.  In millinery the wages are from $6 to $7 per week.  In preserving and fruit-canning wages are from $3.50 to $10, the average worker earning about $5 per week.  Mr. Peck states that in fashion trades the two distinct seasons bring the year’s earnings to about six months.  “Learners” in the trades coming under this head receive $1.50 per week.  Saleswomen suffer also from season trade, as it necessitates reduction of force.  The better class of workers receive from $8 to $15 per week, while heads of departments range from $25 to $50, or even higher, for exceptional merit.  These cases are of the rarest, however, the wage as an average falling below that of Boston.

But three State reports cover the same dates as these already quoted (1885 and 1886),—­Connecticut, New Jersey, and California, the former being for 1885.  In this, women’s wages are given incidentally in general tables, and must be disentangled to find any average.  In artificial flowers the highest wage is given as $7, and the lowest $3, the average being $5.  In blankets and woollen goods the highest is $12.50 and the lowest $6, an average of $9 per week.  In factory work of all orders, wages range from $6 to $9.75 per week, the average paid to women and girls being $7.50 per week.  In clothing, including underwear, wages are from $3 to $15 per week, and the average annual income of women in these trades is given as $300 per year.  In cloakmaking the lowest wage is $3, the highest $9, and the average $7.50.  The average wage for San Francisco is given as $6.95, and that for the whole State is about $6.  The Connecticut report for 1885 gives simply the yearly wage in various trades.  Reason for this is found in the fact that it was the first, and could thus deal with the subject only tentatively.  Clothing is given as producing for women a yearly average of $229, and shirts $237.  Factory work gave $207, paper boxes $227, and woollen goods $245.

In the report for 1886, the lowest average wage is reported as found in the making of wearing apparel; but the average for the State was found to be a trifle over $6.50 per week.

The report from New Jersey makes the lowest wages $3 per week, and the highest $10, the average being $5.  This report covers ground more fully and in more varied directions than any one of the same period, though there is only incidental reference to the work of women as a whole, the returns being given in the general tables of wages.  Wages and the cost of living are compared, and the chapter under this head is one of the most valuable in the summary of reports as a whole.  The report for 1886 gives the same general average of wages for the State, but adds an exhaustive treatment of “Earnings, Cost of Living, and Prices.”

Maine sent out its first annual report in 1887, and gives the wages of women workers as $3.58 for the lowest, and $15.20 for the highest, the annual earnings ranging from $104 to $520.  The report from the same State for 1889 takes up the subject of working-women in detail, giving their home or boarding conditions, sanitary conditions, their own remarks on trades, wages, etc., and the aspect of their labor as a whole.  The average wage remains the same.