Mercado de trabajo y condiciones de vida en Mendoza a comienzos del siglo XX

Abstract

The aim of this work is to analyze the changes and continuities during the process of formation of the labor market in the province of Mendoza in the early 1900s. Wide sectors of the Mendoza population saw their life conditions and social interactions change as a result of the absorption of a significant amount of immigrants by the end of 19 th century, together with a restructuring of production connected to the development of the wine industry. Shortly after the turn of the century, wine had become the main productive activity of that province, which was the most important of the field in nation-wide terms. People involved in different stages of the wine production, from vine growers to industrialists, took part in a society increasingly heterogeneous and diverse. A society, product of the development of capitalism that went on in the province in the last third of 19 th century, that played a part in the process of inclusion of the Argentinean economy in the world market. This period is of great significance because the productive system consolidated around wine production, thus shaping the regional labor market. In this context, the insertion of laborers was uneven in a productive process that requires highly seasonal and unspecialized labor.