Standards of living 1812-32 Flashcards
What had the biggest impact on standards of living at this time?
The continuing upheaval of industrialisation
What two positive things did industrialisation create?
Wealth and employment for many
What undoubtedly happened to a proportion of the population as a result of industrialisation?
They suffered deprivation and were perhaps worse of as a result
What does Toynbee say about industrialisation?
It was disastrous and terrible because side by side with a massive increase in wealth there was also a massive increase in pauperism
What have most historians agreed about wages at this time?
That wages rose considerably after the end of the Napoleonic Wars, up to 1850, possibly doubling, but that most of this increase was due to falling prices rather than increasing wages
What can be argued since we know that real wages improved?
That living standards rose
What do Hilton and Kirby both stress the importance of?
Taking factors other than real wages into account in the standards of living debate
What does Hilton draw our attention to?
That question of the effect of moving from the countryside to the town on the quality of people’s lives
What do Lindert and Williamson say about wages at this time?
The researched a range of occupations and a greater range of items of expenditure and concluded that the wages of clerical and non-manual workers rose more than those of unskilled labourers, especially those on farms
What do Lindert and Williamson’s findings mean?
That the living standards of the middle classes improved more than the majority of the labouring classes, but that the labouring classes weren’t necessarily worse off
What was happening to the class system at this time?
It was becoming more complicated. For instance, there were widening divisions within the working class itself, as there was the growth of a large underclass of labouring poor, who were barely able to rise above poverty levels, and became resentful
List the problems with using real wages to assess living standards at this time
- Many farm labourers were paid in kind with things like subsidised rent, wood fuel and produce
- Wage data excluded the unemployed
- It also doesn’t take into account under employment, like seasonal workers in agriculture or textile workers being laid off when orders declined
- Regional differences in the rate of industrialisation affected wage levels
- Some industries like cotton grew faster than other industries, so wages rose higher and faster
- Wage data tends to consider adult males but not women or children, who often contributed to the household economy but were paid less than men
- Wage data doesn’t account for environmental differences - for instance miners were paid more but were more prone to disease
What is the problem with criticising wage data on the grounds that it doesn’t take employment levels into account?
Because un/underemployment would have to be on a massive scale to counteract the massive rise in real wages during this period
What does Hilton say about living standards between 1783 and 1846?
That there was probably a modest increase in people’s material standards, although the quality of life often deteriorated with the move from the countryside to the town
What does Kirby say about living standards in the post war years?
The non wage evidence supports an optimistic view
