The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-04-19 00:00:00

THE EARNINGS OF THE WORKING
CLASSES.

But let us take a few specimens of the total earn-
ings of classes of labourers. The domestic servants
number about 2,355,000, of whom 309,000 are males
and 2,046,000 females. Assume an average of £l2
per annum each in money wages, and add £25 per
annum for board and lodging, the total is £28,000,000
in money only, and £87,000,000 including board,
lodging, and perquisites. Domestic servants are em-
ployed all the year round, and as a class they are
exceedingly well off. In agriculture there are em-
ployed as many as 2,346,000, and agricultural wages
have risen considerably of late years, especially in
counties contiguous to mineral and other centres of
labour. Taking only 13s. per week for the whole
number in money wages, and 2s. 6d. more in other
advantages, such as an allotment of land, wood, some
articles of food, and a cottage at lower rent than it is
worth, and calculating only on 48 weeks' earning in the
year, we have an annual amount of £3l a year in money
wages, or £37, including other advantages, giving
a total of £73,000,000 or £87,000,000 respectively.
In the textile fabrics there are about 1,000,000 of per-
sons engaged, earning not less than 17e. a week, man
and woman alike. Assuming only forty-five weeks'
labour for these, we have an annual income of £3B,
or a total of £38,000,000. There are no other per-
quisites given in this industry. Of common labourers
there were in all about 700,000, and their wages may
be taken all round at 20s. per week, but for not more
than 40 weeks in the year, or £4O a year, making a
total of £28,000,000. Here we have in these four
classes of labourers a total of about 6,400,000 persons,
having together a money income of about
£167,000,000, or including food, lodging, &c.,
£240,000,000. But there are £6,000,000 more at
work in the United Kingdom, including nearly all
the skilled industries. Probably some 5,000,000 men
are thus employed, at wages averaging 20s. a week,
but whose employment cannot be taken at more than
forty-eight weeks in the year; and 1,000,000 women
and children, in the receipt of probably 10s. a week
for forty-eight weeks, or £24 a year, giving a total of
£299,000,000 per annum. We have thus the total
income of the labouring classes, amounting to
£466,000,000 in money wages, or £539,000,000
including board, lodging, and other perquisites.
The number of earners thus estimated is about
12,400,000, which, to 25,000,000 persons belonging to
tile artisan ana LibutuiLit; giro ono oarnor fr
every two persons, or about two earners for every
family of four and a half, the average being £B4 per
family in money wages only, or £9B including all
other allowances. Is this a sufficient income for the
wants of our working classes? It must be noted that
the average does not represent the real proportion in
which the total income is divided. Here we see a
common labourer earning, when at work, only 20s. a
week, with half a .dozen infants to support. There is
a family whose head is incapacitated by illness from
earning a farthing; and there, again, we find a number
of families suffering from a strike or a turn-out. The
best earners, moreover, among our working men are
not always the most frugal; nor are the facilities for
earning equal in every part of the. kingdom, or in
every district.—Professor LCOlli Levi in the Leisure
Hour.