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Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

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Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#61

Post by ghaff »

joncrane wrote: post #6
tmaly wrote: post #4

In the same respect as this post, the Golden Age made some insanely wealthy people. If you have ever visited the mansions in Newport, RI, the Breakers is something to marvel at. But what fascinated me more was how Cornelius “the Commodore” Vanderbilt actually built his wealth. If you visit the mansions, they only talk about the social life and everything about the mansions. But Commodore amassed some like 200 million…

At The Breakers, all the bathrooms had hot and cold running fresh and salt water. I believe many of the fancy mansions in that area had. I remember visiting on a field trip from nerd sleepaway camp in Massachusetts. As an adult, I could see myself splurging to get running salt water in my seaside mansion. I've always loved salt water.

One of the things I found interesting about The Breakers is that--hot and cold running water notwithstanding--the living quarters were pretty spartan even by middle class standards today. All the bling was in the public rooms.

These were summer "cottages" to be sure and the same dynamics probably didn't apply to their regular homes. Nut I found it interesting nonetheless.

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#62

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

nilkn wrote: post #43
computator wrote: post #16

I want to understand the fascination with Jane Austen's works, especially by hackers and designers (and an economist in this article). Paul Graham (founder of Hacker News) mentions Jane Austen in at least 5 essays, see below. I haven't read any of Austen's books, but I think I'll need to. (1) "Everyone admires Jane Austen. Add my name to the list. To me she seems the best novelist of all time. I'm interested in how t…

Point (4) strikes me as a bit off because Jane Austen is generally among the easiest classical authors to read. Pride and Prejudice in particular is a simple romance story that can easily be read and appreciated by almost anyone with little to no preparation. Compare this to, say, William Faulkner or James Joyce and calling Austen an example of difficult literature seems almost absurd.

She's very easy to read, but she's not so easy to understand. There are multiple levels of irony and character insight in all of the books.

You can take them at face value as superficial and nostalgic proto-Harlequins, and a lot of readers do. She practically invented the surly and arrogant romantic hero who actually loves his mother and is kind to children, small animals, and feudal tenants.

But the books are actually blisteringly insightful and perceptive social and psychological commentary, written by a fiercely modern spirit trapped rather unhappily in a superficially elegant but oppressively limiting social scene she both loved and hated.

Most contemporary authors wrote as if they were outside the scene and looking in, so you don't get the same sense of ironic but intimate self-disclosure.

Austen wrote as someone inside and looking out, describing her own perceptions and reactions - many of which are contradictory and complex. So as a writer, she's both sympathetic and uniquely fascinating.

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#63

Post by Danieru »

davnicwil wrote: post #60
agent008t wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could always spend wealth on land, building a manor, hiring staff to maintain the land/manor, arts, crafts, travel, even science. Also, how much would Darcy pay for an electricity generator, an old CRT television with a PSX and all the PSX games ever made? That makes comparisons in discretionary spending difficult. But comparing basic spending could be doable. It is, of course, easier to compare such spending for…

Yeah it's extremely interesting to think about - it's all a system and when you think you could just spend more money on whatever was available (building a bigger house, horses, arts, hiring staff) you also have to consider that there would have been much tighter upper limits on all of these. The labour market was extremely illiquid, and smaller, and economies of trade and skills were much more localised than today.…

Isn't a major topic in bride and prejudice how illiquid the property market is?

Mr. Darcy has money, but no one will sell him the land. Flip side the selling of land and thus lose of rent was seen as an act of desperation.

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#64

Post by conjectures »

devchix wrote: post #3

Consols schmonsols! The modern prospector such as Mrs. Bennet would want to know how much is that in today's money. Using the Bank of England's trusty inflation calculator and plugging in 1813 (the year Pride and Prejudice was published), Darcy's worth £681K a year and his friend half that. In the Valley or London, what's that, a director level at a FAANG, and a tech lead? Using the annual yield to derive asset, the…

Inflation figures over 200 years are pretty dodgy. How much was a dose of penicillin, an iphone or a flight to New York in 1819? There's a very real sense in which very average Westerners now are far wealthier than Darcy.

Conversely Darcy would have had far more power than the someone with net worth £16.8-28m would today. He'd probably have had a large say in who the local MP was, the local priest. Probably could turf a large chunk of the local population out of jobs and homes. Likely had a small army of servants.

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#65

Post by ducttapecrown »

nilkn wrote: post #43
computator wrote: post #16

I want to understand the fascination with Jane Austen's works, especially by hackers and designers (and an economist in this article). Paul Graham (founder of Hacker News) mentions Jane Austen in at least 5 essays, see below. I haven't read any of Austen's books, but I think I'll need to. (1) "Everyone admires Jane Austen. Add my name to the list. To me she seems the best novelist of all time. I'm interested in how t…

Point (4) strikes me as a bit off because Jane Austen is generally among the easiest classical authors to read. Pride and Prejudice in particular is a simple romance story that can easily be read and appreciated by almost anyone with little to no preparation. Compare this to, say, William Faulkner or James Joyce and calling Austen an example of difficult literature seems almost absurd.

Wasn't the comparison on the basis of the amount of usage rather than the difficulty of usage?

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#66

Post by xkr »

vl wrote: post #58

In addition to money, there are a lot of things that are unclear in the Jane Austen’s novels for the modern reader. One such thing is time: when Mrs. Bennet asks Mr. Bingley “to dine with then”, at what specific time Mr. Bingley is supposed to show up (he seems to know implied time without asking)?

Is there a chance you know an article that covers timing aspects of the novel?

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#67

Post by ngokevin »

pvg wrote: post #15

One striking thing about Mr. Darcy's income is you could still survive on it (not inflation-adjusted) in a developed country today. It's right around the individual poverty line. It's also close the median household income worldwide.

There's a presidential candidate (Andrew Yang) running on Universal Basic Income which would give every US citizen adult almost that amount ($1K/mo), just to survive especially as automation and AI is ravaging the top five common jobs in the states. The math actually works out to be feasible.

https://www.yang2020.com/what-is-freedom-dividend-faq/

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#68

Post by dsyko »

joncrane wrote: post #6
tmaly wrote: post #4

In the same respect as this post, the Golden Age made some insanely wealthy people. If you have ever visited the mansions in Newport, RI, the Breakers is something to marvel at. But what fascinated me more was how Cornelius “the Commodore” Vanderbilt actually built his wealth. If you visit the mansions, they only talk about the social life and everything about the mansions. But Commodore amassed some like 200 million…

At The Breakers, all the bathrooms had hot and cold running fresh and salt water. I believe many of the fancy mansions in that area had. I remember visiting on a field trip from nerd sleepaway camp in Massachusetts. As an adult, I could see myself splurging to get running salt water in my seaside mansion. I've always loved salt water.

I'm curious what is the reason for having running salt water? For taking baths?

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#69

Post by WalterBright »

devchix wrote: post #3

Consols schmonsols! The modern prospector such as Mrs. Bennet would want to know how much is that in today's money. Using the Bank of England's trusty inflation calculator and plugging in 1813 (the year Pride and Prejudice was published), Darcy's worth £681K a year and his friend half that. In the Valley or London, what's that, a director level at a FAANG, and a tech lead? Using the annual yield to derive asset, the…

I think George Washington was the richest man in America in his time. I toured his Mount Vernon estate. I wouldn't want to live like that.

Re: Mr. Darcy’s Ten Thousand a Year

#70

Post by ghaff »

conjectures wrote: post #64
devchix wrote: post #3

Consols schmonsols! The modern prospector such as Mrs. Bennet would want to know how much is that in today's money. Using the Bank of England's trusty inflation calculator and plugging in 1813 (the year Pride and Prejudice was published), Darcy's worth £681K a year and his friend half that. In the Valley or London, what's that, a director level at a FAANG, and a tech lead? Using the annual yield to derive asset, the…

Inflation figures over 200 years are pretty dodgy. How much was a dose of penicillin, an iphone or a flight to New York in 1819? There's a very real sense in which very average Westerners now are far wealthier than Darcy. Conversely Darcy would have had far more power than the someone with net worth £16.8-28m would today. He'd probably have had a large say in who the local MP was, the local priest. Probably could tur…

And "needed" that small army of servants because he couldn't just buy a reliable car and drive it himself. Cooking and washing were major chores. Dress and other tasks related to his station in life took help in a way that almost no one needs or even wants today.
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