ShmoopTube

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[ musical flourish ]

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And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by the Model T,

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the haughtiest letter in the alphabet.

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All right. Well, how did factories like the one shown in the image

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impact women and immigrants?

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And here are your potential answers.

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[ mumbles ]

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All right, well, here we go.

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The introduction of the assembly line became a driving

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[ chuckles ] force in the American economy.

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But we need to figure out what happened to

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women and immigrants who went along for the ride.

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Did factories like the one in the image impact

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women and immigrants because B - they required families

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to move outside familiar urban areas?

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Huh? Well, actually, many of these large factories were based

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in major cities, so there wasn't a whole lot of relocation required.

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Could these factories have affected women and immigrants

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because C - they forced employees to work

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long, low-paid hours?

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Well, labor disputes over grueling hours existed long before

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the adoption of the assembly line. So that's a strike against C.

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Did these factories affect women and immigrants because D -

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they sparked labor disputes to earn the workers fair pay?

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Hmm. Well, workers had been grumbling about low wages

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for decades, so the introduction of the assembly line

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didn't really make any waves there.

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Which means factories like the one in the image impacted

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women and immigrants because A - they offered

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new opportunities for groups of unskilled workers.

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The assembly line transformed industrial practices

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by making it possible for unskilled workers to become

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specialized in a specific task.

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So A is the correct answer.

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The invention of the assembly line really opened doors

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for many female and immigrant workers.

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Uh, well, factory doors, at least.

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