Black Death Vs Small Pox Essay

The Black Death and Smallpox were terrible plagues that lead to great loss of human life. As a result, Europe’s population decreased by a third and experts estimate that the New World lost more than 90 million. Both the Black death and Smallpox raised wages, were used as weapons and lead to loss of religious faith, but during the time of the Black death people lost faith in god, whereas during Smallpox, Indians lost faith in their traditions and the Black Death allegedly conserved the land, whereas Smallpox did just the opposite.
One major effect both the Black Death and Smallpox had on society was raised wages. Because of the great loss of life, much of the labor force was gone and there was more demand for workers. After the Black Death,the gap between the treatment of workers and employers became smaller. Because there were fewer manual labor employees, demand for these laborers increased. Wages and conditions had to improve to attract the limited workforce. These conditions led to the invention of the clock. Limited laborers required a more organized work day with finite start and stop times. No longer could industry rely on sunrise and sunset to determine their
Explorers brought Smallpox into the New World and it spread rapidly. However, while the white explorers seemed to be unaffected by smallpox the citizens of the tribal nations were dying quickly. This confused and upset the members of the tribal nations because they valued their health. The tribal people observed that the Europeans didn’t seem to even take care of basic hygiene (e.g. poor attention to oral hygiene and bathing)whereas the tribal people practiced careful cleansing such as bathing in different temperatures. In order to protect themselves against Smallpox, tribal people exchanged their traditions, adapting the diet and lax hygiene of the Europeans in hopes that they too would be spared further losses in