Women's Wages
"Give her the wages of going on, and not to die."
Women's Wages
BY
WILLIAM SMART, M.A.
LECTURER ON POLITICAL ECONOMY IN QUEEN MARGARET COLLEGE
AND IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW
GLASGOW
JAMES MACLEHOSE, St. Vincent Street
PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY
1892
A paper read before the Philosophical Society of Glasgow,
9th Dec., 1891.
WOMEN'S WAGES.
It is not necessary to prove that women's wages are, as a rule, muchunder those of men. In the textile trades of Great Britain, whichconstitute the largest department of women's work, the average ofwomen's wages is probably—in Scotland it is certainly—about tenshillings per week. This labour is not by any means unskilled, as anyonewho has ever seen a spinning or weaving factory knows. Twenty shillingsper week, however, is a low average for a man possessing any degree ofskill whatever.
In a paper read before the British Association at Cardiff, Mr. SidneyWebb gave some valuable statistics on the subject. Women workers hedivides into four classes—manual labourers, routine mental workers,artistic workers, and intellectual workers. The two latter classes maybe dismissed in a word. Sex has little to do in determining the wages oftheir work. A novelist, a poet, a writer of any sort, is under nodisadvantage that she is a woman, while in many departments of artisticwork women have an obvious advantage. But in the third class, that ofroutine mental workers, Mr. Webb finds that women's earnings areinvariably less than men's. In the Post Office and Telegraph[Pg 6]Departments, in the Savings Banks, and in the Government officesgenerally, where women do precisely similar work with men, and aresometimes, as in ledger work, acknowledged to do it better, theyinvariably earn much less. The largest experiment yet made in thisdirection is that of the Prudential Life Assurance Office, which beganin 1872 to substitute women clerks for the lower grades of men clerks.There are now 243 ladies employed in routine clerical work, which theyare said to do more efficiently than men. The salaries run thus:—£32for the first year, £42 for the second, £52 for the third, and £60 onpromotion—probably half of what men might be expected to accept. InGlasgow lady typists and shorthand writers are offering their servicesfrom 9.30 till 5, with one hour for dinner, for £25. In the teachingprofession women almost invariably receive lower remuneration than men.The Education Department Report of 1888-90 gives the average wage ofteachers throughout England and Wales as £119 for men and £75 for women.Similarly low salaries are found under the London School Board, in theSecondary Schools, and in girls' schools generally as compared withboys' schools.
The exception noted by Mr. Webb is interesting and, I think, suggestive.In the United States, where women teachers often alternate with men inthe same school, the salaries of women are habitually lower. But in theState of Wyoming, where women have a vote, the salaries are equal.
Coming now to the manual workers,