The Textile Workforce (1882-1925) Women had long been a part of Germany’s economic development. In the early period of German industrialization, manufacturers utilized female labor in the countryside to avoid the urban guild system. By the end of the nineteenth century, a significant increase in women’s participation in the formal economy was already evident (the growth rate for their participation averaged over 30 percent from 1882 to 1925). The figures for Prussia are even more striking – there, the dominant role of agriculture was first supplanted by industrial production in the 1890s.
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page 1 of 1 The Textile Workforce (1882-1925)   German Reich Prussia Rhine Province Government District Düsseldorf (Prussia)   Men Women Total Men Women Total Men Women Total Men Women Total 1882   Number 527,079 323,780 850,859                   % 61.9 38.1                     Growth                           1895   Number 517,230 427,961 945,191 125,210 120,492 245,702       50,880 40,846 91,366 % 54.7 45.3   51.0 49.0         55.7 44.3   Growth - 1.9% 32.2% 11.1%                     1907   Number 529,008 528,235 1,057,243 234,867 210,585 445,452 101,282 73,425 174,707       % 50.0 50.0   52.7 47.3   58.0 42.0         Growth 2.3% 23.4% 11.9% 87.6% 74.8% 81.3%               1913   Number       199,058 205,120 404,178       60,852 62,992 123,844 %       49.3 50.7         49.1 50.9   Growth       - 15.2% - 2.6% - 9.3%       19.6% 55.6% 35.5%   1925   Number 514,858 681,262 1,196,120 229,012 245,471 474,483 88,205 78,915 167,120       % 43.0 57.0   48.3 51.7   52.8 47.2         Growth - 2.7% 29.0% 13.1% 15.0% 19.7% 17.4% - 12.9% 7.5% - 4.3%       Source: Wilhem Bochmert, "Wandlungen der deutschen Volkswirtschaft, 1888-1907: Ergebnisse der Berufs- und Bertriebszählungen" [“Changes in the German National Economy: Results of the Census for Professions and Enterprises”], Arbeiterfreund [The Worker’s Friend] 48 (1910): 24-25, 136; George Neuhaus, "Die berufliche und soziale Gliederung im Zeitalter des Kapitalismus" ["The Professional and Social Structure in the Age of Capitalism"], in Grundriss der Socialökonomik [Outline of Social Economics] (Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1914), 9: pp. 399, 424-25. Reprinted from Kathleen Canning, Languages of Labor and Gender: Female Factory Work in Germany, 1850-1914. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996, p. 32. Copyright © 1996 by Cornell University. Used by permission of the publisher, Cornell University Press, www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.
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