Earnings Inequality in Nineteenth-Century Britain

Abstract

Although debate has raged ever since Marx and Engels openly condemned British capitalism in the 1840s, little hard evidence has been brought to bear on the issue of economic inequality. This paper estimates British earnings distributions for four years in the period 1827–1901. The evidence supports the view of increasing inequality up to mid-century and a leveling thereafter. Coupled with newly available evidence on British eighteenth- and nineteenth-century wealth and income distribution, these estimates equip us to search for explanations. A strategy for modeling British inequality history is suggested.