Some Aspects of the Life of the Jewish Proletariat in Poland during the lnterwar Period

Summary

THE peculiar nature of the Jewish proletariat in Poland and its sheer magnitude require considerably wider treatment than that accorded to the working class in general. This applies to the whole of Poland. While taking into account the various attitudes of sociologists and analysts of social structures in this fieldand of the actual economic living conditions of the Polish population during that period, I propose to include the following groups of workers in the Jewish proletariat: not only wage-earners, i.e. manual workers, cottage workers, and white-collar employees, but also non-hired elements, such as craftsmen working without any hired help (referred to as ‘self-employed’ in the statistical nomenclature) or those whose self-employed status had not been confirmed. In addition, I incorporate in this group certain elements which had been temporarily engaged in street trade and those who were working in various sectors of the economy but not as hired labour (porters, barbers, cart-drivers, washerwomen, etc.).

The Jewish proletariat, perceived in this way, differed from the Polish working class in general by its very social composition. In 1931 it numbered 684,500 actively working people, which amounted to 61 per cent of the total economically active Jewish population. This figure was composed of 57.3 per cent hired labour and 42. 7 per cent non-hired workers.

The Jewish proletariat comprised 60-1 per cent of the active workforce of the Jewish population during the entire first decade of independent Poland, but its numbers rose dramatically during the following decade.

The occupational structure of the proletariat is a function of the economic structure of the country and the whole nation in question. The economic structure of the Jewish population emerged under the influence of historical factors which were dissimilar to the circumstances of the majority of the remaining citizens of the country. The fact that about 80 per cent of the Christian population lived in the country, and, conversely, 76.4 per cent of the Jewish population inhabited the towns, suggests an inverted economic pyramid for the two groups. While in 1931 66.7 per cent of the Christian population made a living from farming, including a third of the whole working class, 78.8 per cent of the Jews were engaged in industry and trade and only 4 per cent made a living from farming.