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How did the United States become a mature industrial society in the decades after the civil war? Industrial economy By the 1913 the United States produced one third of the world’s industrial output. The 1880 census showed for the first time that a majority of the work force engaged in non-farming jobs. Worker’s freedom in an industrial age .for a minority of workers, the rapidly expanding industrial system created new forms of freedom. Between 1880 and 1900 an average of 35,000 workers perished each year in factory and mine accidents, the highest rate in the industrial world. Class divisions became more and more visible. Many of the withiest Americans consciously pursued an aristocratic lifestyle. The working class lived in desperate†¦show more content†¦Many americans sensed that something had gone wrong in the nation’s social development. Freedom, inequality, and democracy†¦ many Americans views the concentration of wealth as inevitable, natural, and justified by progress. Gilded age reformers feared that with lower-class groups seeking to use government to adv ance their own interests, democracy was becoming a that to individual liberty and the rights of property. Liberty of contract. Labor contracts reconciled freedom and authority in the workplace. How did reformers of the period approach the problems of an industrial society? The knights of labor in an industrial age, the knights of labor organized all workers to improve social conditions. The conditions essential to liberty, labor raised the question whether meaningful freedom could exist in a situation of extreme economic inequality. Middle-class reformers, alarmad by fear of class warfare and the growing power of concentrated capital, social thinkers offered numerous plans for change. Middle-class reformers, alarmed by fear of class warfare and the growing power of concentrated capital, social thinkers offered numerous plans for change. Labor and politics, henry George ran for mayor of new york in 1886 on labor ticket. The events of 1886 suggested that labor might be on the verge of establishing itself as a permanent political force.