Note 361 — Chapter XVII · DOMESTIC SERVICE IN EUROPE

M. Bienaymé has attempted, with the aid of information gained through employment bureaus, personal recollections, household expense books, and similar means, to give the wages paid in France since 1815. The results of his investigations seem to show that wages in nearly every branch of domestic service have steadily increased since that time, until now the wages of an ordinary cook are 50 francs per month and a chambermaid the same, while a general servant receives 40 francs per month, the wages of all these classes of house servants having doubled the past sixty years. At the same time the cost of maintenance has also increased. He gives a table showing the increase, or in some cases the decrease, in wages in every branch of domestic service during this period. Journal de la Société de Statistique de Paris, November, 1899.

Practically the same estimates are given by M. Georges Salomon in “La Domesticité,” La Nouvelle Revue, February 1, 1886. He cites a similar opinion from M. Jules Simon.

Mr. Booth shows a gradual increase in the wages of servants as they grow older or are advanced to better positions, but this does not necessarily show a general increase from year to year. VIII., pt. II., passim.

Mr. A. E. Bateman considers it impossible to state, for England, what the movement of wages in domestic service has been. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, LXI., 264-265.