A Chinese Labourer Lifts a Bale of Tea Weighing 420 pounds

In old pre-revolutionary China most people earned their living by farming (usually as sharecroppers) or as unskilled manual labourers. Their lives were especially hard. Their back breaking work earned them very little money.

In this picture, taken around 1911, a labourer is lifting a sack full of cotton weighing many times the man.  Cotton and tea were the main Chinese cash exports.

This dock worker is seen carrying a 420-lb bale of cotton from a ship to the Hangkow Bund. He probably earned less than a dollar and half per week,  low even for 1911 standards. But in some ways he was lucky; most peasants were not able to earn any cash and relied on barter.