Social Life

The total occupied population of the United Kingdom towards the end of the nineteenth century has been estimated as follows: ¹

	Working class	Middle and upper classes
1881	11,840,000	2,610,000
1901	13,800,000	3,940,000

In this categorization shop assistants were taken as the humblest members of the middle class. Middle-class numbers overall were not only continuing to grow fast, they were also increasing proportionately within the workforce. 'From above, the younger sons of the aristocracy have been dropping into the more active ranks of the middle class - "going into trade." From below, the best men of the working class are still pushing up.' So wrote one observer in 1885. ²

Growth of the middle class. England and Wales. Males. Numbers occupied in certain groups (in thousands)
	1881	1901
Professions and administration	248	343
Commerce, clerks, and miscellaneous	397	694
Dealers and assistants	652	915
Employers not included above	169	217
Farmers	203	203
Total	1,669	2,372
Others occupied	6.090	7,785
All occupied	7,759	10,157
Percentage middle class of all	21.5	23.3

The middle classes were not only more numerous but also better off than ever before. United Kingdom taxable income - that is, income over the exemption limit and therefore clearly belonging to the middle and upper classes - had averaged just over £200 million per annum in the 1860s; but by the early 1870s it had doubled, and by the early 1890s it had passed £600 million. The number of middle-class persons in the United Kingdom with taxable incomes has been estimated at rather more than 300,000 about 1860, over 500,000 by the mid 1870s, and about 850,000 by the mid 1890s. ³