Packingtown Chapter Summary

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whole idea of an unregulated industrial capitalism takes advantage of poor immigrants who will work for limited wages. When the family agrees to buy the house, it comes full of hidden cost which the house was already in poor shape. As the cost of living goes up the whole family including the children are forced to go to work in terrible conditions. Jobs in Packingtown are back breaking labor with extremely unsafe conditions. For the young finding a job is quite easy, factory owners are looking for young people to work in the factory. Jurgis, Marija, and Teta find work quickly, Jurgis’s father, Dede Antanas, finds a job only after agreeing to pay another man a third of his wages for helping him obtain the job. But the poor working conditions and lighting are too much for the old man, and it quickly kills him.…show more content…
Jurgis forced to work at an unheated slaughterhouse which has poor lighting, risking his life every single day he goes to work. Jurgis joins a union and begins to understand the mass political corruption and bribery that makes Packingtown run. Packingtown keys on taking advantage of poor immigrants trying to live the “American Dream.” The rich factory owners get rich while the immigrant worker risks their life for a minimal wage. Sinclair’s extreme detail of the poor working conditions let you envision what was going on. Jurgis claims, “It was the incarnation of blind and insensate Greed. It was a monster devouring with a thousand mouths, trampling with a thousand hoofs; it was the Great Butcher--it was the spirit of Capitalism made flesh.”

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