A 1911 study of Armour Meats in Chicago (five years after Upton Sinclair’s exposé The Jungle was published) found that the average weekly pay for 10 hours a day, six days a week, was $9.50, whereas the living wage for a family of five, the average size at the time, was $15.40. But Armour swore it would pay whatever it wanted or close its factory doors. Armour successfully broke three strikes and blacklisted union leaders. Read more Chicago and labor history in Tazia and Gemma (see NOVELS).
