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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 December 2008
For the historian of modern European society the problem of the extent and nature of unemployment at any particular time and in any particular place is a challenging and even frustrating one. It is clearly an important question to ask and yet, except for very recent times, it is almost impossible to answer satisfactorily. Where there are data they are incomplete and their reliability doubtful. This is true even of such a society as Victorian Britain, which might be thought to have a considerable amount of useful material. The early Victorian social investigators in Britain seldom dealt with the problem of unemployment, preferring to focus on educational, sanitary, and similar elements of working-class living standards. Admittedly, from the middle of the nineteenth century continuous series of unemployment figures become increasingly available relating to particular trades and from these aggregate figures have been calculated.1 But the defects of these returns, made by various trade unions and based upon the numbers receiving unemployment benefit, have been recognized almost from the time that they began to appear. As for official labour statistics in general, those for the period before 1886 have recently been described as “deficient, chaotic, and unmanageable”.2 The unemployment statistics improved little after 1886. They continued to be derived from the same sources as before, though a much greater number of unions made returns. But the very nature of the returns means that they were biassed towards the unionised workers in industries like heavy engineering.
page 48 note 1 E.g., see Mitchell, B. R. and Deane, Phyllis, Abstract of British Historical Statistics (Cambridge, 1962), pp. 64–5.Google Scholar
page 48 note 2 Davidson, Roger, “Llewellyn Smith, the Labour Department, and government growth 1886–1909”, in: Sutherland, Gillian (ed.), Studies in the growth of nineteenth century government (London, 1972), p. 279.Google Scholar
page 49 note 1 For the history of the Booth survey see S., T. and Simey, M. B., Charles Booth, Social Scientist (Oxford, 1960), passim.Google Scholar
page 49 note 2 Theses are housed in the library of the London School of Economics and Political Science.
page 49 note 3 Condition of the Working Classes. Report and Tabulation of Statements made by men living in certain selected districts in London in March, 1887 [Parliamentary Papers, 1887, LXXI].Google Scholar Hereafter Tab. Statements.
page 49 note 4 Jones, Gareth Stedman, Outcast London (Oxford, 1971).Google Scholar
page 49 note 5 Times, 8 January 1887.
page 49 note 6 Times, 11 January 1887, letter from W. H. Birley,
page 49 note 7 Hansard, Third Series, Vol. 312, cc. 532–3.
page 50 note 1 Times, 22 January 1887.
page 50 note 2 Tab. Statements, p. vii.
page 50 note 3 Hansard, Third Series, Vol. 320, c. 1732.
page 50 note 4 Tab. Statements, p. xv.
page 51 note 1 Ibid., p. iii.
page 51 note 2 Ibid., p. 4.
page 51 note 3 Ibid., p. 5.
page 51 note 4 Royal Commission on Labour, Minutes of Evidence, Group B [PP, 1892, XXXVI, Pt II], p. 129.Google Scholar
page 52 note 1 Royal Commission on the Aged Poor. Minutes of Evidence [PP, 1895, XIV], p. 135.Google Scholar
page 52 note 2 Booth, Charles, Life and Labour of the People in London, 3rd ed. (London, 1902–1903), Series I, Vol. I, p. 138.Google Scholar
page 52 note 3 Excluding just this one group the correlation coefficient is 99. A useful introduction to simple statistical methods for historians is Roderick Floud, An Introduction to Quantitative Methods for Historians (London, 1973).Google Scholar
page 54 note 1 This has been calculated by assuming that those out of work for more than twelve weeks were, on average, unemployed for sixteen weeks. For example, there were 645 seamen, bargemen, and lightermen included in the returns. 297 stated that they had been in work throughout the winter, 6 that they had been unemployed for 0–2 weeks, 19 for 2–4 weeks, 40 for 4–6 weeks, 16 for 6–8 weeks, 46 for 8–10 weeks, 27 for 10–12 weeks, and 177 for more than 12 weeks while 18 could not be certain. Thus the percentage of average unemployment was 100 Х (297 Х 0+6 Х 1 + 19 Х 3+40 Х 5 + 16 Х 7+46 Х9 + 27 Х 11 + 177 Х 16) equals 20(645–18) 31.2%.
page 55 note 1 From Tab. Statements, p. 4.
page 56 note 1 The sugar bakers are also in this category. Although a declining industry the refineries worked to a very regular pattern throughout the year. The confectioners had a long busy season from October to July and a fairly short but very intense slack season in late summer and early autumn.
page 57 note 1 For a general discussion of the problem of seasonality see Stedman Jones, op. cit., pp. 33–51.
page 57 note 2 Margaret, A.Tillard and Charles Booth, Life and Labour, Series I, Vol. I, p. 230.Google Scholar
page 57 note 3 Ibid., p. 231.
page 57 note 4 B. R. Mitchell and Phyllis Deane, op. cit., pp. 64–5.
page 58 note 1 In any case, too much may be made of these objections: a large proportion of the Victorian working class did not have to worry about the complications of separate kitchens, bathrooms, or lavatories.
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