Cost of living in German towns

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 866449027

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-93831

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Cost of living in German towns

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: Stat. Off.

Year of publication:: 1908

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (LXI, 548 Seiten)

Collection:: Economics Books

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326 MAGDEBURG. According to this Table the predominant retail prices of meat as bought by working-class families were no higher in December, 1906, than in October, 1905. This would seem incompatible with the rise in officially ascertained retail prices of beef and pork as shown in the Table on p. 324, where a kilogram of beef which cost 146 pfennige in 1905 is shown to have cost 155 pfennige in 1906, and a kilogram of pork, sold at 146 pfennige in the former, to have cost 166 pfennige in the latter year. The equivalents in English money and weight are :— Price per lb. 1905. 1906. Beef ... ... ... ... ... Pork ... ... ... ... ... 8 d. 9 \d. In this connection the following points must, however, be remembered. The official figures are simple means of monthly ascertainments of the prices of particular cuts irrespective of the class of customers with whom the butcher has to deal. The prices returned for the purpose of the present inquiry relate to a particular month in each of the two years, and from among a dozen quotations for each cut, that price (or range of prices) only has been selected which appeared to be predominant. The butchers were, moreover, asked to state the prices usually paid by working-class customers. These prices, it would seem, are now in some cases lower than those charged for the same quality of meat to middle-class customers, and it is held among butchers that retail prices of meat have for some time been at a point beyond which workpeople will not go, and that the burden of any further rise must be borne by those who are best able to bear it. Under present conditions the per capita consumption of meat among the working-classes no doubt falls short of the amount shown above as representing that of the population as a whole. Evidence with regard to this is afforded by returns obtained from 99 typical working-class families in Magdeburg as to the quantity and cost of various household provisions usually consumed in the week. These showed an average weekly consumption per head of 23§ ounces, or at the rate of 77 lbs. a year. Of this, 34 per cent, was sausage, 29 per cent, was beef and 28 per cent, was pork and bacon. One-third of all the meat eaten by the working-classes takes the form of sausage, of which there is great variety in quality and price, from the article sold in the horsemeat shop for 3d. or 4d. per lb. to that sold as Schlackwurst at Is. bd. per lb. The sausage most generally eaten, however, is either Leberwurst or Rotwurst, either of which costs about 9d. per lb., that is to say, quite as much as an equivalent weight of beef or pork. The popularity of sausage appears, in fact, to rest not on considerations of economy, but on the fact that it saves trouble in cooking. Prices at Magdeburg are low, except as regards meat. Taking the level of prices at Berlin as 100, the index number for the price of meat at Magdeburg is 111, for other food 98, for all food 101, for coal 73, and for all commodities 97. The index number for rent and prices combined is 86, which would indicate that the cost of living is lower in Magdeburg than in any other of the large towns included in this inquiry.

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