A Higher Quality of Life for Whom? Mouths to Feed and Clothes to Wear in the Families of Late Nineteenth-Century American Workers

Abstract

Children need to be fed, clothed, and sheltered. Historically, an additional baby usually implied a reduction of consumption by other members of a family, a burden that was not necessarily shared equally. Social historians have ignored the issue of inequality within the family. Using the household budgets of nearly 6,000 American workers surveyed in 1889-1890, this article attempts to remedy that neglect. It analyzes the differential impact of higher fertility, measured by the number of children in the household under age five, on the consumption of husbands, wives, and siblings. In response to higher fertility, the wife rather than the husband sacrificed more. Contemporary opinion demonstrates that clothing expenditures provide a good indicator of the extent of involvement in social life beyond the household. A statistical study of expenditures for the clothes of husbands, wives, and children corroborates this interpretation and suggests that the family consumption economy could be an arena of conflict. Finally, the article explores the meanings of the improving consumption status of wives during the twentieth century.