Mr. W. Taylor, F.S.S., read to the British Association a
paper containing some very suggestive facts. The total number of labourers in England and Wales of all classes living on weekly wages and working with their hands is, including their families, 8,144,000, less than half the population. Of these, 1,178,000 are skilled artizans, or say 200,000 grown men ; 4,009,000 are half-skilled artizans, or say 800,000 grown men ; and 2,957,000 agricultural and unskilled labourers, or say 600,000 grown men. The average earnings of a skilled man range from £60 to 173 a year ; of a half-skilled man from £46 to £52, and of an unskilled man or agricultural labourer from £20 to £41. These averages would show prosperity in the working-class, the lower agricultural labourers excepted, and their total earnings are 1276,000,000 a year; but they throw away 258,000,000 a year on alcohol, so paying to the publicans a fifth of all their receipts, that is, a four-shilling income.tax, and a total sum nearly double the whole of the taxes they pay the State. Teetotalism has not the moral merits its advocates proclaim, or Mussalinans would be better men, but it certainly would make us the richest people on earth.
Previous page
