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Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

fullstackeconomics.com

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Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#111

Post by dustintrex »

Interestingly enough, I'm typing this in Singapore, where in 2022 it's quite common to have a "maid" (helper/domestic worker, in the current local lingo), but no car.

Singapore imports domestic workers for poor neighbouring countries like the Philippines and Myanmar, which keeps wages very low, on the order of US$450/month, not too far off Christie's inflation-adjusted US$220/month. Even the fully loaded cost with government levies, insurance, food & board etc is on the order of $1000/month, considerably cheaper than most other childcare options, particularly if like most Singaporeans both parents work longer hours.

By comparison, Singapore strictly limits the number of cars on the road, auctioning permits called "Certificates of Entitlement" to the highest bidder and imposing around 100% taxes on the cars themselves. As a result, a plain vanilla Toyota Corolla costs US$120,000 all in. What's more, half of that is the COE cost, which is valid for only 10 years, meaning the value of the car depreciates by around $10,000 every year. Add in petrol, servicing, parking etc, and having a live-in helper to run errands and drop off kids etc starts to look quite affordable in comparison.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#112

Post by Thorrez »

kube-system wrote: post #78
notfbi wrote: post #51

" The couple’s annual income was around around £700 ($50,000 in today’s dollars)—£500 ($36,000) from his salary and another £200 ($14,000) in passive income. They rented a fourth-floor walk-up apartment in London with four bedrooms, two sitting rooms, and a “nice outlook on green.” The rent was £90 for a year ($530 per month in today’s dollars). To keep it tidy, they hired a live-in maid for £36 ($2,600) per year, wh…

That's because being a maid wasn't even seen as an equal to the idea of a "working class job" as we see it now. Someone who had to support a family at that time would have been presumed to have an income from a man's job. Someone working as a maid was presumed to not have their own household to support and had their housing provided.

I doubt a live-in maid has a husband.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#113

Post by biztos »

dustintrex wrote: post #99
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Thailand I can say this isn't the case

Many attractions in Thailand have dual pricing, with foreigner pricing in Arabic numerals (100 baht) and local pricing in Thai numerals (๒๐ บาท). The price differential is often 5x or more.

I was visiting some temples in Bangkok recently and was amused to find there was no dual pricing; rather, there was an admission charge for foreigners and no charge for Thais.

(I don’t mind this system actually, but if I were paying taxes in Thailand and still had to pay foreigner entry fees everywhere it might bug me.)

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#114

Post by L_Rahman »

fastball wrote: post #104
dendriti wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience in SEA in general and Bali specifically (as a Malaysian), prices are not simply a matter of speaking the language. Vendors often charge based literally on your social class/status.

In other words: your skin color.

Vendors in Bangladesh, where I grew up and where my family is from and where I look like I was born, try to rip me off the second they get the slightest inkling I'm American.

Very little to do with skin color, it's just most often the biggest giveaway that the buyer is a foreigner.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#115

Post by dustintrex »

fastball wrote: post #104
dendriti wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience in SEA in general and Bali specifically (as a Malaysian), prices are not simply a matter of speaking the language. Vendors often charge based literally on your social class/status.

In other words: your skin color.

That's a factor, but given the kaleidoscope of ethnicity in most of SE Asia, it's nowhere near that straightforward. People can and do pick up on social class based on dress, the way you speak, the way you address others etc, just as they do in the US.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#116

Post by manmal »

rodric wrote: post #109

‘they hired a live-in maid for £36 ($2,600) per year’ It should be noted that in those days low-wage workers might spend half their income on food.* Presumably as a live-in maid her room and board were provided, so her compensation was not as low as her salary alone might imply. *cf https://ahundredyearsago.com/2019/05/30/percentage-of-u-s-to...

Still, it's pretty much impossible to have a family (or provide for any other human being, e.g. sick relatives) on such an allowance alone. Marriage, and maybe even partnership, was often out of the question for two people who both held such jobs.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#117

Post by pcurve »

jandrese wrote: post #73
pcurve wrote: post #25

Live in maid is fairly common in other countries still including Hong Kong where you can hire one for less than $1k / month with allowance, other expenses included. It's not just for the riches. Many dual income families have them even if they're little above middle class.

It seems like it will be a popular option in any country that has abject poor you can hire for a pittance but also a middle class.

live in maid service has been tightly regulated by HK gov't for decades. There's minimum wage. Requirement for stipends. Proof of income and assets. etc. Workers are usually from southeast Asia from lower cost of living.

I lived in HK in the 80s and while we didn't have a maid, our 3BR apt had a separate maid room by the kitchen w/ own bathroom. It wasn't uncommon to see that.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#118

Post by [deleted] »

maximus-decimus wrote: post #90
jandrese wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is hard to compare because Agatha Christie didn't have an internet bill to pay, but also didn't have access to a huge chunk of the world's knowledge at her fingertips. This goes for a lot of things. Her healthcare would have been much less expensive than modern care, even adjusting for inflation, but she would also be more likely to die of disease or injury.

I wonder how much she paid for an RTX 3090. I find it funny how people compare an RTX 3090 to a top of the line gpu from 10 years ago and act as if they should be the same price just because they're both the best. You just can't compare prices between decades when the things being compared improved many folds.

[deleted]

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#120

Post by [deleted] »

adrianN wrote: post #92
amscanne wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They didn’t suggest that, it said: > Still, Christie didn’t consider herself wealthy Almost no one considers themselves wealthy. Even people that are very well-off typically consider themselves some variation of middle class, because they can so obviously and clearly see the next rung up the ladder, and how they are not on it. This point is made perfectly by her quote about how only the rich have cars.

The middle class is just very wide. Essentially anybody who doesn't starve when they're out of work for a couple of months is middle class. Upper class is distinguished from middle class whether you have to work at all. Very few people have enough passive income to afford a ~median lifestyle. Agatha Christie might not fit into middle class, but today a lot of people do.

[deleted]
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