Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Eric Schneider
Author-Workplace-Name: History Faculty and Nuffield College, University of Oxford, UK
Author-Email: eric-schneider@nuffield.ox.ac.uk
Title: Real Wages and the Family: Adjusting Real Wages to Changing Demography in Pre-Modern England
Abstract: This paper uses demographic data drawn from Wrigley et al.’s (1997) family
reconstitutions of 26 English parishes to adjust Allen’s (2001) real wages to the
changing demography of early modern England. Using parity progression ratios (a
fertility measure) and age specific mortality for children and parents, model families
are predicted in two reference periods 1650-1700 and 1750-1800. These models yield
two levels of interesting results. At the individual family level, we can measure how
different families’ real wages changed over the family life cycle as additional children
were born. At the aggregate level, we can predict thousands of families using Monte
Carlo simulation, creating a realistic distribution of median family real wages in the
economy. There are two main findings. First, pregnancy and lactation do not create
cyclical effects in the family’s income. Instead, most families’ welfare ratios decline
steadily across the family life cycle until children begin to leave the household,
increasing the welfare ratios. Second, Allen’s real wages understate or match the
median of the predicted demography-adjusted distributions.
X-Classification-JEL: 
X-Keywords: 
Length: 35 pages
Creation-Date: 2012-05-31
Number: _099
File-URL: http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/12033/schneider99.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
Handle: RePEc:nuf:esohwp:_099