Real incomes of the British middle class, 1760-1850: the experience of clerks at the East India Company

This article uses the earnings of clerks employed at the East India Company's London offices and warehouses to examine the emergence of age-related salary payment systems after 1790, and the growth of nominal and real incomes in one sector of the British middle class between 1760 and 1850. Middle-class spending patterns in London are examined and a new index of middle-class living costs for the period 1780-1850 is introduced. The article concludes that growth in the demand for clerical and administrative skills, and the introduction of age-related salary payment systems, resulted in the average real earnings of clerks doubling between 1780 and 1840, compared with an average increase of less than 10 per cent among manual workers.