The document discusses how the lives and literature of the Lowell mill girls followed the principles of the Efficient Market Hypothesis. It examines how the semi-strong form of the EMH best fits the situation, as the girls used their insider information from The Lowell Offering publication to change their value system and drive equality and power relations. The magazine served to correct inefficiencies in acquiring information and influence larger economic trends, demonstrating how the EMH can be applied to social issues through an economic lens.

1. K S H I T I J K U L K A R N I
The Lowell Offering and the
Efficient Market Hypothesis

2. PURPOSE OF THE WORK

3. Efficient Market Hypothesis

5. It may be seen that the lives of the Lowell mill girls
and the literature they produced follows the
Efficient Market Hypothesis. In addition, the
EMH can be extended in this case, to information
being used to drive equality and power relations
between the girls and their managers, suitors, and
family.
Thesis

6. Which form should we choose?
Not the strong form, because their insider information
was used to change their value system.
The semi-strong form fits best, because The Lowell
Offering was a publication.

7. The mode of dispersion of information in the Lowell
mills was largely verbal, but The Lowell Offering itself
is a validation of the Efficient Market Hypothesis in
relation to the girls.
The magazine can be viewed as the market correcting
for inefficiencies in the acquisition of information.

8. Susan’s Letters
Susan, in her second letter, for example, states “it
looked so pleasant at first, the rooms were so light,
spacious, and clean,” in an attempt to convince her
reader that her decision to come to the Lowell mills
was justified (New England Mill Girls 51).

9. “transformation of farm girl into factory operative”
(New England Mill Girls 43)

10. Women’s agency
Lobbying for economic freedom
Managers unable to prevent information spread
Information is a fluid entity

11. RELIGION?

12. “sweet incense of sincere gratitude to the bountiful
Giver of these rich blessings” (New England Mill Girls
64)

13. More on purpose
“’Offering” to whom?”
(Freeman 111)

14. “process for converting the brute, laboring body into
the abstracted body of the fashion plate, the
sentimental heroine”
(Freeman 113)

15. Justification leads to social change
In doing so, the piece Two Suicides is extremely
effective, and also brings about an interesting
discussion about the Efficient Market Hypothesis in
relation to the mills.

16. “giv[ing] away their lives in some noble cause,”
(New England Mill Girls 204)

17. “not only that manual
laborers could be writer,
but that writers should be
manual laborers”
(Freeman 116)

18. Extension of thesis
The Lowell Offering itself acts as a natural force in the
market
was meant to influence larger economic trends

19. IN CONCLUSION:
The Lowell Offering stands a testament to the
connection between labor and women, and its relation
to the general economic outlook in the United States
during the 19th century.
In this manner, it is possible to understand social
issues through an economic lens.

20. Works Cited
Brown, Stephen J. "The Efficient Market Hypothesis:
The Demise of the Demon of Chance?"
Accounting and Finance 51 (2011): 79-95. Web. 4 Nov.
2015.
Freeman, Elizabeth. ""What Factory Girls Had the
Power to Do": The Techno-logic of Working-
Class Feminine Publicity in The Lowell
Offering." Arizona Quarterly: A Journal of
American Literature, Culture, and Theor 50.2
(1994): 109-28. Project Muse. Web. 4 Nov. 2015.
New England Mill Girls. The Lowell Offering. New
York: W. W. Norton, 1977. Print.