“Few wives in antebellum America enjoyed a life free from labor. Family life depended on the smooth performance of an extensive array of unpaid occupations in the household, and on the presence . . . of someone to provide that work—to supervise the children through the vicissitudes of a changing social and economic order; to make and mend clothes, quilts, pillows, and other household furnishings; to shop for items the household could afford . . . , and scavenge . . . for those it could not; to clean, cook, and bake; and, whenever necessary, to move from unpaid to paid labor to bolster the household income. The growth . . . of the cash [economy] of the Northeast had not rendered this labor superfluous. Nor had it reduced housework to unskilled labor.”

Jeanne Boydston, historian, Home and Work, 1990

QUESTION: Which of the following most directly contributed to the situation described in the excerpt?

a The abolitionist movement
b The market revolution
c The emergence of mass political parties
d Increased immigration

Antebellum America refers to the period before the civil war. There were a series of revolutions that marked this period. The event that most directly contributed to the situation described in the excerpt is;

b. The market revolution

The market revolution was a series of changes that affected the economy of the American nation in the first half of the nineteenth century.

Many Americans began moving from the rural areas to the cities where they worked in the factories. Women were affected too as they began working away from home to provide income for their households.

So their movement from "unpaid to paid labor" was characteristic of the market revolution.

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