=Workmen’s Compensation.=—­No small part of the poverty in cities was due to the injury of wage-earners while at their trade.  Every year the number of men and women killed or wounded in industry mounted higher.  Under the old law, the workman or his family had to bear the loss unless the employer had been guilty of some extraordinary negligence.  Even in that case an expensive lawsuit was usually necessary to recover “damages.”  In short, although employers insured their buildings and machinery against necessary risks from fire and storm, they allowed their employees to assume the heavy losses due to accidents.  The injustice of this, though apparent enough now, was once not generally recognized.  It was said to be unfair to make the employer pay for injuries for which he was not personally responsible; but the argument was overborne.

[Illustration:  AN EAST SIDE STREET IN NEW YORK]

About 1910 there set in a decided movement in the direction of lifting the burden of accidents from the unfortunate victims.  In the first place, laws were enacted requiring employers to pay damages in certain amounts according to the nature of the case, no matter how the accident occurred, as long as the injured person was not guilty of willful negligence.  By 1914 more than one-half the states had such laws.  In the second place, there developed schemes of industrial insurance in the form of automatic grants made by state commissions to persons injured in industries, the funds to be provided by the employers or the state or by both.  By 1917 thirty-six states had legislation of this type.

=Minimum Wages and Mothers’ Pensions.=—­Another source of poverty, especially among women and children, was found to be the low wages paid for their labor.  Report after report showed this.  In 1912 Massachusetts took a significant step in the direction of declaring the minimum wages which might be paid to women and children.  Oregon, the following year, created a commission with power to prescribe minimum wages in certain industries, based on the cost of living, and to enforce the rates fixed.  Within a short time one-third of the states had legislation of this character.  To cut away some of the evils of poverty and enable widows to keep their homes intact and bring up their children, a device known as mothers’ pensions became popular during the second decade of the twentieth century.  At the opening of 1913 two states, Colorado and Illinois, had laws authorizing the payment from public funds of definite sums to widows with children.  Within four years, thirty-five states had similar legislation.