One way was Taylorism. Frederick W. Taylor had been a steel company foreman who closely analyzed every job in the mill, and worked out a system of finely detailed division of labor, increased mechanization, and piecework wage systems, to increase production and profits. In 1911, he published a book on "scientific management" that became powerfully influential in the business world. Now management could control every detail of the worker's energy and time in the factory. As Harry Braverman said {Labor and Monopoly Capital}, the purpose of Taylorism was to make workers interchangeable, able to do the simple tasks that the new division of labor required-like standard parts divested of individuality and humanity, bought and sold as commodities.
( Howard Zinn )
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