Money is everything--at least, according to the affluent. In 2017, eight dollars of every ten dollars was acquired by the wealthiest one percent in America (“Oxfam: The 1% grabbed 82%,” 2018). Americans strive to manifest wealth in their lives to achieve satisfaction. The more dollar bills one has the higher one can stack them so he or she can ascend higher on the social hierarchy. This philosophy of always having money on the mind is prevalent in Rebecca Harding Davis’s novella “Life in the Iron Mills.” The story focuses on the life of Deborah and Hugh, iron mill workers living in a 19th century town blanketed in smoke. Hugh and Deborah live in a state of the perpetual lack of money; while their bosses are dreaming of cash Hugh and Deborah
…show more content…
The iron mill owner, Kirby, and his son Clarke, the overseer, are preoccupied by money. As a result, they are dismissive of the oppressive mill environment. This is exemplified in Clarke’s behavior, when a man accompanying Kirby and Clarke comments on the wellbeing of the iron mill workers: “‘They are bad enough, that’s true. A desperate set, I fancy. Eh, Clarke?’ The overseer did not hear him. He was talking of net profits just then…” (Davis 11). While Kirby’s visitors are, to an extent, flabbergasted and disoriented by the mills, Kirby is unwavered by the workers and working conditions as, “Young Kirby looked curiously around, as if seeing the faces of his hands for the first time” (Davis 11). “Life in the Iron Mills” debunks the assumption that the entire upper class is blindsided by money but rather the elitest of the elite--the one percent of today. The fact that Kirby and his son, the highest in power out the visiting gentlemen, do not seem to recognize the atrocious atmosphere of the mills demonstrates the upper class is not conscious of the state of those below them, but have deliberately decided to ignore them. During an intellectual debate between Kirby and his visiting party, Kirby boisterly proclaims, “I wash my hands of all social problems--slavery, caste. white, or black. My duty to my operatives has a narrow limit--the pay-hour on …show more content…
Lanius insists, “Hugh is not granted access to the privileges of sentimentalism precisely because he is a wage slave...” (Lanius 28). Yes, money has the power to be the emancipator or the dictator in an individual’s life but only because of Americans’ desire for money produces injustice, an abstract idea beyond the scope of human materialism. The scales of justice, held by a blindfolded lady, has metaphorically been tipped by the wealthy who use their money to work smarter not harder (“Lady Justice”). When Hugh is on trial for an alleged larceny, he “would choose no lawyer...” (Davis 25) because in his heart Hugh knew, “God...never made the difference between poor and rich...Oh, he knew that!” (Davis 22). The American capitalist system is governed by injustice: the upper class’s inability to recognize those below them as humans with a purpose, not money
The iron mill owner, Kirby, and his son Clarke, the overseer, are preoccupied by money. As a result, they are dismissive of the oppressive mill environment. This is exemplified in Clarke’s behavior, when a man accompanying Kirby and Clarke comments on the wellbeing of the iron mill workers: “‘They are bad enough, that’s true. A desperate set, I fancy. Eh, Clarke?’ The overseer did not hear him. He was talking of net profits just then…” (Davis 11). While Kirby’s visitors are, to an extent, flabbergasted and disoriented by the mills, Kirby is unwavered by the workers and working conditions as, “Young Kirby looked curiously around, as if seeing the faces of his hands for the first time” (Davis 11). “Life in the Iron Mills” debunks the assumption that the entire upper class is blindsided by money but rather the elitest of the elite--the one percent of today. The fact that Kirby and his son, the highest in power out the visiting gentlemen, do not seem to recognize the atrocious atmosphere of the mills demonstrates the upper class is not conscious of the state of those below them, but have deliberately decided to ignore them. During an intellectual debate between Kirby and his visiting party, Kirby boisterly proclaims, “I wash my hands of all social problems--slavery, caste. white, or black. My duty to my operatives has a narrow limit--the pay-hour on …show more content…
Lanius insists, “Hugh is not granted access to the privileges of sentimentalism precisely because he is a wage slave...” (Lanius 28). Yes, money has the power to be the emancipator or the dictator in an individual’s life but only because of Americans’ desire for money produces injustice, an abstract idea beyond the scope of human materialism. The scales of justice, held by a blindfolded lady, has metaphorically been tipped by the wealthy who use their money to work smarter not harder (“Lady Justice”). When Hugh is on trial for an alleged larceny, he “would choose no lawyer...” (Davis 25) because in his heart Hugh knew, “God...never made the difference between poor and rich...Oh, he knew that!” (Davis 22). The American capitalist system is governed by injustice: the upper class’s inability to recognize those below them as humans with a purpose, not money