MKIV original price?

[Julian]

The Telegraph states the "average UK annual wage in 1950" as being around £100, or £2 per week.

[AshbyCut]

Just goes to show ... the internet is a wonderful place ... as long as you take it all with a pinch of salt !!!

http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/in ... 014AA4sFWm

[Julian]

Just goes to show ... the internet is a wonderful place ... as long as you take it all with a pinch of salt !!!

http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/in ... 014AA4sFWm

I don't think any of the quoted figures are actually 'wrong'.
The problem is that earnings are not an even distribution (ie not a 'bell curve' or 'normal' distribution), they are heavily skewed at the higher end, especially by the top one 1%, who currently earn somewhere above £150000 year but for some as much as several or many £millions per year.

This means that the arithmetic 'mean' earnings of all full time earners will be a much higher figure than the arithmetic 'median' - simply due to how mathematically the mean and median are calculated.
However because earnings are a 'skewed' distribution the 'median' represents a 'truer' representation of what more typical earnings might be.
As usual figures quoted are motivated by what the interests of those using the figures would like to show - therefore choosing one type of average or another type of average can give widely different answers.

No doubt giving credence to the often quoted phrase - 'there are lies, damned lies, and then there are statistics'

[Nobby]

That chart is about right Mal.

I'm able to check my wife's income after serving as a copper for 30 years. I'd say coppers are pretty well paid since 1976 though so are surely above the avarage pay scale?

[Woodytia]

Interesting to see how expensive the Kennet perfection was back then.

[Dave Burr]

I have to disagree with you there Nobby, in the mid to late seventies police pay was appalling, I knew sergeants who's kids qualified for free school meals. It did improve when Maggie's lot got in but they were tough times.

Looking at the estimates for wages on here I can see that I continued on from my schooling and have always been below average

[Nobby]

I have to disagree with you there Nobby, in the mid to late seventies police pay was appalling, I knew sergeants who's kids qualified for free school meals. It did improve when Maggie's lot got in but they were tough times.

Looking at the estimates for wages on here I can see that I continued on from my schooling and have always been below average

I suppose it's all comparative, Dave. I was one of those coppers in the Seventies and Eighties and after a report commisioned by the Labour Party in about '72 we got pay rise after pay rise. The Conservatives just carried on with what had already been agreed before they came to power again.
Though in London it was somewhat offset by having WRDs taken away ( Worked Rest Days...effectively a 6th day's work in a week for time and a half ).


I mentioned it only as I was able to correlate my own, and my wife's wages, and recognised what we used to earn in that chart. Back in the Seventies I was a single man living in rent-free accomodation, so I had it easy...I wasn't trying to raise a family on it, but the numbers looked right.


Usually I find I don't agree with these 'average this' and 'average that' charts, but that one looked close enough.

[Julian]

If the 'average' is based on the mathematical calculation of the arithmetic mean ( and it often is if its in the interest of those publishing to make it appear higher ) then for earnings about 20% earn at or above the 'average' and 80 % below( for reasons I explained in my previous post on this thread).

I believe the current average earnings for full-time employees is roughly £40000, which means that probably 20% earn this and above, and 80% earn below this figure ( many a long way below).

[Julian]

Take a look at the first table on this link, and the bottom line of the second table and you can see how unevenly earnings are distributed, and just how few people earn more than the 'average' today:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_in_ ... ed_Kingdom