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COST OF LIVING

BOOKLETS DISTRIBUTED. In September of last year the Department of Labor distributed 2500 booldets amongst the workers in the principal centres of the Dominion, with a view to a record being kept by individual workers of the exact cost of living, receipts and expenditure, during the twelve months. This was with the object of guiding the Department in dealing with its annual labor statistics. The period allowed for filling in the tables expires at the end of this mouth, when the Department proposes to collect the booklets through its agents. About 800 have been distributed in each of the four centres, and if the information has been carefully recorded, as anticipated, the data thus supplied will be of a valuable nature, especially as a Royal Commission is shortly to lie set up on this question by the fiovernment. SOME FIGURES OF 1875. In view of the enquiry that is to be made into the cost of living, the following details, culled from a publication 'by Sir Julius Vogel in 1875, are interesting:— In Wellington retail prices, were as follows:—Beef, Id to, 4du>tr'}'lb; .mutton, 3d to 4d; pork, Gd per lis; veal, Gd per lb; lamb, 3s to 4s per qiWter; flour, 2d per lb or I<">s per 1.0 ft.. Potatoes rail from 4s to Gs per cwt., to season. Butter was Gd to Is"a lb; sugar, 4Vjd, ii'/jd and (id a lb; cofi'ee, Is fid to Is 8d per lb; cheese, 8(1 to Is lb; bread, 3d to -Id per 21b loaf. Just at. the period named houses in Wellington were scarce, owing to the growth in population. Rents were consequently high. An ordinary four-room-ed cyttage could be had at from 9s to 12s h week; cottages of the same size, but of a superior kind, at lis to 15s; comfortable six-roomed houses, in good situations, ranged from £4O to £«0 a year, and larger establishments from £3O to -CIOO.

Against the above quotations it is interesting to set the wages current at tlie time. Married couples earned from £oo to £7O per annum; farm laborers, .€4O to £(i() per annum and found; carpenters, 12s a day; blacksmiths, 10s to 12s a day; sawyers, 8s Gd to lis (id per 100 ft (making an average wage of from £3 to £4 a week); road laborers, (is to Ss a dav; ploughmen, 2.)s a week; shoemakers, 10s a day; tailors. £3 to £3 Ms a week; bakers, £2 10s to £3 per week; pattern-makers, boiler - makers, and moulders. 10s to 14s a day: wheelwrights, 12s a day; store laborers, £2 to £2 10s a wek; female domestic servants, Sis to I'm per week find found; hotel cooks, £2 a week and found.-—Wel-lington Times.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/TDN19110913.2.41

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 70, 13 September 1911, Page 5

Word count
Tapeke kupu
455

COST OF LIVING Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 70, 13 September 1911, Page 5

COST OF LIVING Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 70, 13 September 1911, Page 5

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