truck system

noun

truck system

a system during the early years of the Industrial Revolution of forcing workers to accept payment of wages in kind, usually to the employer's advantage

First recorded in 1820–30

C19: from truck ²

The truck system, the payment of the operatives in goods, was formerly universal in England.

The truck system is here the rule, not the exception, and is carried on in the most direct and undisguised manner.

Under this truck system the employers made profits both ways.

The Englishman, when he finds the truck system far from home, cannot too strongly revile it.

Till one has seen the truck system at work, its evil effects in enslaving and demoralizing the poor are impossible to realize.

April 18, 2024petrichor

[pet-ri-kawr]

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