A posting on Facebook caught my attention last week. Printed by the Deltura Repertory Company (whatever that is!), its title is “The Year is 1915 – Just One Hundred Years Ago”.
“The average life expectancy for men was 47 years,” begins a list of changes that have occurred in the last century.
“Fuel for cars was only sold in drug stores,” it continues.
What really captured my imagination, though, were some economic and employment statistics. I don’t know how accurate the data is, but it does provide food for thought.
“The average U.S. wage in 1910 was 22 cents per hour,” it says. “The average worker made between $200 and $400 per year.”
A “competent accountant” would make about $2,000 annually, a dentist could earn about $2,500, a veterinarian’s earnings would run from $1,500-$4,000 per year and a mechanical engineer’s wage could reach $5,000 yearly.
So, according to the information provided, an accountant made about five times more than an average (presumably unskilled) worker, a dentist about six times more, a vet up to 10 times more and an engineer could count on a multiplier of 12 or more.
How, I wondered, does that equate to today’s workforce? If an “average” full-time employee in B.C. earns just over $1,000 weekly (according to welcomebc.ca) or about $50,000 annually, an accountant would have to earn at least $250,000 to maintain the spread from a hundred years ago. The dentist would earn about $300,000, the vet at least a half-million and the engineer’s annual income would exceed $600,000.
In some cases, the translation to modern day earnings doesn’t seem too far out of whack. But consider that a minimum wage (typically unskilled) employee only grosses about $20,000 when working full-time. That’s only about 40 per cent of average.
Still, though, the general picture remains similar. But things get more interesting when changes in prices are considered. The “average worker” salary has increased by a factor of more than 100, but the price of sugar, four cents a pound in 1915, has risen by about 35 times.
Eggs were 14 cents a dozen, or about one 35th of what I pay for local eggs in the grocery store. At 15 cents a pound, coffee looks like a steal compared to today’s 10 bucks or more a pound, about 70 times more.
I had to venture further afield to get some other comparisons. Steak, in 1915, ran about 25 cents a pound and that price has risen by about 40 times. Milk was nine cents a quart, or maybe a 12th of what we pay today. Overall, 15 cents worth of food in 1915 now costs about $3.50, an increase factor of 23.
A century ago, the price of gas in California was about 12 cents a gallon. The recent drops at the pumps have brought today’s price down to around $2 US, or 25 times more. Of course, a few years ago the factor was closer to 50.
Going to a movie costs about 100 times more than it did 100 years ago, but the price of shoes has only gone up by about 30 times.
Looking at the big picture, prices really aren’t that much different, compared to 100 years ago. But are we better off? Probably not much, if at all, because of the consumer choices we now have. Most of us have monthly costs for telephone, television and Internet, in addition to the expense of purchasing technology.
Personally, given the choice between living in a cheaper, less expensive world, I wouldn’t take it. I like living in an age that brings information and entertainment to my fingertips and I am fully aware that work took a much greater physical toll a century ago. We live longer and by most measures we are healthier, too. But it is interesting to think that 100 years ago, the five leading causes of death were pneumonia and influenza, tuberculosis, diarrhea, heart disease and stroke. Today cancer and heart disease are the big killers, the flu and pneumonia are generally minor illnesses, tuberculosis is a memory. and when did you last hear of diarrhea as a cause of death?
My favourite quirky bit of info in the Deltura document? “Marijuana, heroin and morphine were all available over the counter at drugstores. Back then, pharmacists said, ‘Heroine clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach, bowels and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health!’ ”
Who knew?
Lorne Eckersley is the publisher of the Creston Valley Advance.
