Note 102 — REMINISCENCES OF VILLAGE LIFE AND OF PANAMA AND CALIFORNIA. 1840-1850.
Reading edition
Mr. Bancroft affirms that “the great majority of diggers obtained little more than the means to live at the prevailing high prices, and many not even that. In 1852 the average yield in cash for the 100,000 men engaged in mining was only $600, or barely $2 a day, while wages for common laborers were twice or three times as much.”