5 ms·

They were paid $2.50 a day. Which is around $91 in today dollars. On top of that wage theft was all too common. And that's a wage that they had to fight to unio

by culi 3y ago

They were paid $2.50 a day. Which is around $91 in today dollars. On top of that wage theft was all too common. And that's a wage that they had to fight to unionize to get up to

Retric 3y ago
Assuming I am reading this right in 1905 1/4 of male workers over 16 made 8$/week or less. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc1.cu56779232&seq=14 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc1.cu56779232&seq=1... For unskilled labor 6 days a week at 2.50/day = 15$/week which would have been quite tempting especially if the risks where unclear. It’s worth remembering when doing inflation calculations just how poor people used to be. Take the average person’s budget today and remove their car, gadgets, AC, subscriptions, most of the pricy food options, etc. Healthcare was cheap and largely ineffective, collage was rare and minimalist by todays standards. Most of what people spend money on today simply didn’t exist so not having it was normal.
- mschuster91 3y ago
  > It’s worth remembering when doing inflation calculations just how poor people used to be. And also, how much of the wealth created by the employees ended up in their pockets vs. the pockets of the owners, and how the standards of living were. Basically, back then with such a job you could afford a place to live, to have kids, a wife to take care of housework and, post 1930-ish, a car. Today? Most of my generation struggles to make rent because we're being bled dry.
  - kiba 3y ago
    Lifestyle inflation, urban planning, and choices makes living a quality life more difficult than it should be. You're able to afford a larger house and a car or two, but you're also spending more money than necessary on transportation and housing. Buying a car is expensive and so is the road built for cars. Trains are more expensive than a car, but its cost can be amortized across many riders. Housing is a problem of both government and market dysfunction and is directly tied to our transportation woes. People are tied to the idea of real estate as an investment which means they often opposed development. Planners continued to zone only SFH, and made middle housing illegal. They also don't do mixed zoning which improve efficient utilization of land. I supposed if income goes to workers more, they would just push the housing price higher. It can't be fixed unless we build sufficient housing.
    - Retric 3y ago
      Lifestyle inflation is why people don’t feel so much wealthier than their grandparents, but housing isn’t the economic drain it seems like because so much of its value doesn’t require resources to create. It’s mostly redistribution of income from workers to other people and as such it gets into politics. Well that and the giant ball of suck associated with long commutes, but I am kind of hoping there’s going to be more pushback on that due to people working from home during COVID. Even those who still needed to go in had vastly less traffic.
      - kiba 3y ago
        If you increases the income of workers that's going to go to right back into housing, unless you made changes on how the housing market works.
  - s1artibartfast 3y ago
    And if we are talking late 1800's/early 1900's, Taxes were essentially non-existent, so people kept and spent more of their money. Taxes as a % of GDP was in the 5-10% range, opposed to ~40% today. They also didn't have to worry about the same healthcare costs, as they were healthier in general, and the options were far fewer when sick.
    - benj111 3y ago
      >as they were healthier in general Source? Survivorship bias? How many people do you know who've had polio? Small pox? Rubella? Mumps? Died from a bacterial infection? Blinded from cataracts?
      - s1artibartfast 3y ago
        You failed to quote the critical part of the sentence. >They also didn't have to worry about the same healthcare costs, as they were healthier in general, and the options were far fewer when sick. People were less obese, spent less time battling disease, and died younger. It's somewhat similar to survivorship bias, but it is a real effect. You can look up population incidence and prevelance rates for diabetes, obesity, alzheimer's, and cancer yourself.
        Retric 3y ago
        Polio etc survivors may have been less obese but they didn’t spend less time battling disease. Often someone would be dealing with the consequences of childhood illnesses or injuries for decades.
        s1artibartfast 3y ago
        Indeed, but I am talking about the sum of all disease. Polio is a good example of the opposite, because polio today is effectively zero. Most other types of disease trend the other way with much more significant margins. Polio lead to some level of paralysis in somewhere between 0.5-0.2% percent of people, many of whom died and needed no further healthcare. Today, a far larger percent of Americans have lost the ability to walk due to obesity and diabetes.
  - benj111 3y ago
    We've got richer while food has got relatively cheaper, transport has got relatively cheaper, all the things you need to live have got relatively cheaper, so it isn't really surprising that all the extra money is going towards people's homes. On top of that all the nice things have gotten cheaper. Listening to music is now cheap. Books, news, entertainment are cheap. Yes you may have had a car (24 million cars in 1940 v 135million population) but then you wouldn't have had a fridge, TV. And youre comparing someone relatively wealthy, to someone who can't afford rent. If you were poor you probably didn't have electricity, indoor toilet, more than one heated room in the house, and probably lucky if you could afford enough food. I'm from the UK and we went through this a bit later so it's still within living memory. My dad remembers getting an indoor toilet an plumbed in bath for the first time, that was late 50s/ early 60s.
  - j-a-a-p 3y ago
    > Today? Most of my generation struggles to make rent because we're being bled dry. As a kid I remember visiting a friend who lived in an old workers house. I was in awe to see such a small house, and in shock to learn they actually bought two houses and connected them.

by culi 3y ago

They were paid $2.50 a day. Which is around $91 in today dollars. On top of that wage theft was all too common. And that's a wage that they had to fight to unionize to get up to

Retric 3y ago

Assuming I am reading this right in 1905 1/4 of male workers over 16 made 8$/week or less. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc1.cu56779232&seq=14 https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nnc1.cu56779232&seq=1... For unskilled labor 6 days a week at 2.50/day = 15$/week which would have been quite tempting especially if the risks where unclear. It’s worth remembering when doing inflation calculations just how poor people used to be. Take the average person’s budget today and remove their car, gadgets, AC, subscriptions, most of the pricy food options, etc. Healthcare was cheap and largely ineffective, collage was rare and minimalist by todays standards. Most of what people spend money on today simply didn’t exist so not having it was normal.

mschuster91 3y ago
> It’s worth remembering when doing inflation calculations just how poor people used to be. And also, how much of the wealth created by the employees ended up in their pockets vs. the pockets of the owners, and how the standards of living were. Basically, back then with such a job you could afford a place to live, to have kids, a wife to take care of housework and, post 1930-ish, a car. Today? Most of my generation struggles to make rent because we're being bled dry.
- kiba 3y ago
  Lifestyle inflation, urban planning, and choices makes living a quality life more difficult than it should be. You're able to afford a larger house and a car or two, but you're also spending more money than necessary on transportation and housing. Buying a car is expensive and so is the road built for cars. Trains are more expensive than a car, but its cost can be amortized across many riders. Housing is a problem of both government and market dysfunction and is directly tied to our transportation woes. People are tied to the idea of real estate as an investment which means they often opposed development. Planners continued to zone only SFH, and made middle housing illegal. They also don't do mixed zoning which improve efficient utilization of land. I supposed if income goes to workers more, they would just push the housing price higher. It can't be fixed unless we build sufficient housing.
  - Retric 3y ago
    Lifestyle inflation is why people don’t feel so much wealthier than their grandparents, but housing isn’t the economic drain it seems like because so much of its value doesn’t require resources to create. It’s mostly redistribution of income from workers to other people and as such it gets into politics. Well that and the giant ball of suck associated with long commutes, but I am kind of hoping there’s going to be more pushback on that due to people working from home during COVID. Even those who still needed to go in had vastly less traffic.
    - kiba 3y ago
      If you increases the income of workers that's going to go to right back into housing, unless you made changes on how the housing market works.
- s1artibartfast 3y ago
  And if we are talking late 1800's/early 1900's, Taxes were essentially non-existent, so people kept and spent more of their money. Taxes as a % of GDP was in the 5-10% range, opposed to ~40% today. They also didn't have to worry about the same healthcare costs, as they were healthier in general, and the options were far fewer when sick.
  - benj111 3y ago
    >as they were healthier in general Source? Survivorship bias? How many people do you know who've had polio? Small pox? Rubella? Mumps? Died from a bacterial infection? Blinded from cataracts?
    - s1artibartfast 3y ago
      You failed to quote the critical part of the sentence. >They also didn't have to worry about the same healthcare costs, as they were healthier in general, and the options were far fewer when sick. People were less obese, spent less time battling disease, and died younger. It's somewhat similar to survivorship bias, but it is a real effect. You can look up population incidence and prevelance rates for diabetes, obesity, alzheimer's, and cancer yourself.
      - Retric 3y ago
        Polio etc survivors may have been less obese but they didn’t spend less time battling disease. Often someone would be dealing with the consequences of childhood illnesses or injuries for decades.
        s1artibartfast 3y ago
        Indeed, but I am talking about the sum of all disease. Polio is a good example of the opposite, because polio today is effectively zero. Most other types of disease trend the other way with much more significant margins. Polio lead to some level of paralysis in somewhere between 0.5-0.2% percent of people, many of whom died and needed no further healthcare. Today, a far larger percent of Americans have lost the ability to walk due to obesity and diabetes.
- benj111 3y ago
  We've got richer while food has got relatively cheaper, transport has got relatively cheaper, all the things you need to live have got relatively cheaper, so it isn't really surprising that all the extra money is going towards people's homes. On top of that all the nice things have gotten cheaper. Listening to music is now cheap. Books, news, entertainment are cheap. Yes you may have had a car (24 million cars in 1940 v 135million population) but then you wouldn't have had a fridge, TV. And youre comparing someone relatively wealthy, to someone who can't afford rent. If you were poor you probably didn't have electricity, indoor toilet, more than one heated room in the house, and probably lucky if you could afford enough food. I'm from the UK and we went through this a bit later so it's still within living memory. My dad remembers getting an indoor toilet an plumbed in bath for the first time, that was late 50s/ early 60s.
- j-a-a-p 3y ago
  > Today? Most of my generation struggles to make rent because we're being bled dry. As a kid I remember visiting a friend who lived in an old workers house. I was in awe to see such a small house, and in shock to learn they actually bought two houses and connected them.