With the Industrial Revolution, which started in the middle of the century, came new machinery that saved time and made some people very wealthy. The rich were getting richer and the poor, poorer. Many people were out of work because suddenly machines were doing their jobs.
There was no government assistance for the unemployed, and many had trouble finding their next meal or a warm place to sleep.
Poor craftsmen and laborers lived in just two or three rooms, and the poorest families lived in just one room with very simple and plain furniture.
The rich by contrast:
lived luxuriously in lavish, elegant mansions and country houses, which they furnished with comfortable, upholstered furniture.
Some things do change - there are govt handouts and poorest families now live in tents and many on the street. Now jobs replaced by high tech AI - some human lookalikes - all for efficiencies and making some more rich and some poorer still. Bob Hawke promised in 1987 there will be no child poverty by 1990. Has the promise been fulfilled and if so when? Suspect it's another one of those labor broken promises - like cheaper power bills - ring a bell?? AIMO
