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#1: Money Questions Author: Róisín, Location: Ireland

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 10:55 am
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In particular, private incomes, dividends etc. Where are these private incomes coming from? And why do they *all* have them? Even Kathie Ferrars has 'dividends' that come through to her yearly. I am thinking it is something like will money that is left to them and then invested by shadowy solicitors that we never see, but am I right? Surely not all the private incomes in the CS come from wills Confused

Also, in a slightly related question, did the CS staff get paid a lower salary because all of their meals and accomodation was provided for? Do you think they could claim expenses when going to Paris to meet the students off the London train?

#2: Author: Lottie, Location: Humphrey's Corner

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:08 am
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I always assumed that the private incomes were dividends from shares. That always makes me think of the beginning of the Forsyte Saga. I think perhaps Kathie's might have been something like National Savings Certificates which matured that year, and she decided to cash some of them in for her new outfit, rather than re-investing all of them.

I presume that travelling to Paris for escort duties would be paid for by the School. And I imagine CS salaries reflected the fact that all board and lodging was provided during term-time. I don't suppose EBD even considered how that would have been adjusted for the very few staff who lived out.

#3: Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:12 am
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I worked as a Nanny for a mother who had a private income. She came from a wealthy family who obviously had money invested that she got when she came of age. Kathie Ferrars lost both parents so am assuming she got hers from her parents.
About the cost of the journey to pick up girls, they would get paid for that as it's part of the job. Living expenses are part of the pay usually however because you are on call 24/7 they do have to pay you for that. I spoke to a boarding school nurse who told me how good the pay was because she was on call 24/7. Boring job but good money

#4: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:25 am
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The private income will be dividends from shares or interest on savings accounts, or possibly - and very probably at that time - money from war bonds/national savings.

In Kathie's case, possibly some money left to her by her late parents and left over from whatever her aunt and uncle needed for her keep/education would have been invested for her.

#5: Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:37 am
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Presumably Kathie's parents had a house and furniture, and there might have been insurance on their lives, and that would have been invested to provide an income for Kathie, and perhaps some family money too. The point then was that Kathie's trustees could have used the income or part of it for her maintenance and education, but she would not have been able to touch the capital until she was twenty-one and came of age, or had achieved the age stipulated in her parents' will(s).

#6: Author: Caroline, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:50 am
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Grizel's position springs to mind. She is (in her own mind) stuck at the school even after her father dies because her inheritance from him (and possibly her mother, too) is held in trust for her until the ridiculous (to us and her!) age of 35.

She presumably has an income from the trust, but can't touch the capital without the consent of the trustees, one of whom is her stepmother, who vetoes everything. Presumbly her stepmother has a life interest in e.g. the house and part of the trust, and these then both revert to Grizel on Steppy's death - hence her having to come home to sort out the business stuff when her stepmother dies in Reunion.

But I digress!

Another example is Madge, Dick and Joey in School at, who have a small private income from money invested in shares, and presumably would have had a larger income either from more investments or money held in trust for them from their parents, if their guardian hadn't managed to lose it all for them.

Madge wrote:

Just consider how we are situated. We are orphans, with a sister twelve years younger than ourselves to be responsible for. Our guardian got his affairs into a frantic muddle, and then conveniently—for him!—died, leaving us to face the music. You’re in the Forests, and your furlough is up in three weeks’ time; Joey is delicate and shouldn’t live in a wet climate; and between us we seem to have some fairly decent furniture, this house, and three thousand pounds in East India Stock at four per cent.—or something over a hundred pounds a year.’

#7: Author: Róisín, Location: Ireland

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:56 am
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On a related note - how risky were these shares? We do occasionally hear of people losing all their money from investing but AFAIK it is always explained away to bad solicitors. Confused

#8: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 12:12 pm
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Róisín wrote:

On a related note - how risky were these shares? We do occasionally hear of people losing all their money from investing but AFAIK it is always explained away to bad solicitors. Confused

Depends on the time, and also on the type of companies involved. If you date the setting up of the CS to 1926, when School At was written, then that's 3 years before the Wall Street Crash so some families would've lost a lot of money.

In Exile, there are references to both Jem and Jack putting in their money in "safe" investments which would be unlikely to be affected by the political situation.

Probably at some point some people would've lost money due to companies they'd invested in collapsing - presumably that was what Madge wanted people to think when she said that Juliet was going to he helping out at the school because her family had "lost money".

#9: Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 1:09 pm
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All the private income business was always quite alien to me too. It seems that earned salary is never enough. Think of Peter Chester who is 'poor' because he lost his private fortune. According to Helen McClelland, EBD's maternal grandfather was canny with money and invested wisely, which is why she and her mother lived quite comfortably and explains the private schooling etc. Possibly Elinor thought everyone lived like that - 'gentlefolk' at least.

#10: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 1:13 pm
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Purely from my reading of books of the period, I've always been under the impression that for upper middle/upper class people that was in fact the case!

#11: Author: Jennie, Location: Cambridgeshire

Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 1:41 pm
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It depends on where the money is invested. Some companies do collapse, but in general, a lot of money was invested in what were known as Trustee Stocks, which gave a lower rate of return, but were reckoned to be steady and safe investments.

#12: Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK

Posted: Sat Apr 28, 2007 7:41 pm
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Mel wrote:

All the private income business was always quite alien to me too. It seems that earned salary is never enough.

And yet, even as recently as 20 years ago, my mother commented that my husband "only had his salary" - not, you understand, as if it were something to be ashamed of, but just as stating a fact.

We do have people with private incomes these days - they are called "Trust fund babies" or "Trustafarians" by the media. But for the vast majority of people, these days, any private income is the jam on top of the bread and butter of an earned income.

#13: Author: Caroline, Location: Manchester

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 10:00 am
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Mrs Redboots wrote:

Mel wrote:

All the private income business was always quite alien to me too. It seems that earned salary is never enough.

Whereas for the times EBD was writing about it was the other way around - the job (something highly respected like doctor or lawyer or being "in the city") supplemented one's private income.

People of the upper and even upper-middles classes would not have expected to work in those days - their private income / estates / family incomes / inheritance would have supported them (daughters until marriage and older sons, anyway. The younger son might have gone into the church and been given a family living or become an Army officer). So, upper class folks who had to work to support themselves were the exception, and were considered to have fallen on hard times.

Think of Dick Bettany. He did his bit for the Empire (which was almost more Adventuring than a career), but once he inherited the Quadrant, his "job" was owning it and running the estate. And if he had been really upper class, he probably would have had an estate manager to do it for him, and he would have been landed gentry...

Of course, EBD being EBD, her view on this was probably a little stuck in the past...

#14: Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 11:58 am
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It does seem like a different world to me.

Mind you, the standard of living of many of the people mentioned would be difficult to maintain with even a doctor's salary, like the Chesters or the Lucys or even Madge and Jem and Jack and Joey.

They have a big house with associated grounds, multiple servants, a big batch of kids, all in private school (some abroad), holiday homes or other vacations abroad, a governess for the ones too small to be at boarding school, music and art lessons for the kids, and so on and so forth. By my reckoning, that's rich, not comfortably middle class.

The ones I would consider more middle class, economically (have just a salary and struggle to put their kids in private school) are regarded by EBD and those in Chalet Land as 'poor'.

And then, particularly in Austria, you have people in the 'so poor they risk starving in a bad winter' category, but that's different because they're peasants.

#15: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 1:41 pm
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I think there's a difference between a 'private income' which means you don't have to work and can afford foreign holidays, expensive clothes, etc, and a 'private income' which is just a bit extra on top or your salary and comes from a legacy or savings which have been invested. A lot of people, like Kathie, might have the latter.

In more recent years, look at how many people invested in British Telecom, British Gas, etc., shares, which bring in dividends. Plus the interest on building society accounts and so on.

The cost of living was a lot less in the past, house prices were lower, and there weren't so many consumer goods to buy, so people could have what seem like luxuries to us. You might have a servant, but you wouldn't have to pay for a tv and tv licence, computer, two cars, central heating, maybe electricity, etc., etc. In Genius, for example, the Rutherfords live in a big house, but they only have coal fires and they don't heat all their rooms as a matter of course.

It was the very high rates of taxation during and after the war which made a difference to a lot of people; they could no longer afford to keep up big houses; and then the sharp rise in house prices in the '70s and '80s. It used to be possible to afford a good sized house on one salary; now in some places you need two just to get on the housing ladder.

Many of the Chalet school fathers/guardians don't seem to be upper class. They're bankers, businessmen, hotel keepers, journalists, academics, lawyers, clergy and of course doctors - solidly middle class. (Actually, has anyone ever listed the professions of all the pupils' fathers? Might be interesting.)

#16: Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 2:44 pm
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http://cscharacterguide.googlepages.com/professions.html

#17: Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 2:56 pm
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Wonderful list! No teachers I notice! Could be that EBD knew they couldn't afford high school fees or she herself came into little contact with no male teachers, because it's all based on father's occupation.

#18: Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 3:08 pm
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JayB wrote:

The cost of living was a lot less in the past, house prices were lower, and there weren't so many consumer goods to buy, so people could have what seem like luxuries to us. You might have a servant, but you wouldn't have to pay for a tv and tv licence, computer, two cars, central heating, maybe electricity, etc., etc. In Genius, for example, the Rutherfords live in a big house, but they only have coal fires and they don't heat all their rooms as a matter of course.

Unless you actually inherited a house, it was quite normal to rent, too. And even people with big houses and estates could be cash-poor; they might choose to go without luxuries in order to educate their children privately. That wasn't just snobbery - after all, state schools didn't routinely provide secondary education until the 1944 Act, and until the great university expansion of the 1960s, it was far from easy to get in from a State school. And even in my childhood (I may be one of the older ones on this board, but I'm not that old!), many children at secondary schools were withdrawn on their 15th (later 16th) birthday and put to work in a shop or on a farm. The culture of staying on into the sixth form and beyond simply didn't exist a generation ago!

#19: Author: Miriam, Location: Jerusalem, Israel

Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2007 7:18 pm
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JayB wrote:

I think there's a difference between a 'private income' which means you don't have to work and can afford foreign holidays, expensive clothes, etc, and a 'private income' which is just a bit extra on top or your salary and comes from a legacy or savings which have been invested. A lot of people, like Kathie, might have the latter.

My mother has that, from a fund set up by my great grandfather. Every six months the interest from his investment gets divided among my mother and her (seventeen) cousins. It's not a huge amount, but it made a big difference to my parents when they were a fairly poor young couple. I remember often being being told that "Great Grandpa's money has arrived, so we can go and buy a new coat/shoes/dress for the summer/winter". When we were all growing, having that regular 'private income' to rely on helped them a lot. THere was no way they could have manged without my father working though. Now it is just a pleasent extra, and they often use it for cheap holidays abroad.)

(One day in the future my mothers share (1/1 Cool

of this investment will be divided among my self and my two sisters. I am told that we each stand to get about £20,000. The amount he invested originally must have been huge - and well managed.)

#20: Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK

Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 4:46 pm
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I think you could get some sort of annuity that would pay out about 5% of the cash per year for the rest of your life. So a bit like a pension but you got it younger. I remember reading a Daphne Du Maurier book where the little girl is (allegedly) the illegitimate offspring of a king (James II?) and her mother is trying to get a lifetime allowance set I think on pretty much this basis. (Sorry it’s all a bit hazy now!)

I was reading an interesting article sort of on this topic in the Sunday Times at the weekend. It was about how a professional could no longer afford a large house in a ‘decent’ area of London (N.B. Kingston Upon Thames was where the poor impoverished offspring of one of the people mentioned was forced to live.) They were talking very much about the upper middle class, e.g. a surgeon. They said that what you might have had in the past was a house in Chiswick, a country house, the kids in Eton or similar) Nowadays that would cost more than a surgeon earns. They linked it all back to house prices; apparently between 1967 and 2005 while the price of the average house went up by a multiple of 47, the more expensive end went up by 87 times. Basically they have been forced out of London and it makes sense as a lot of the high end property is bought up my foreign money these days.

They made no mention of private means although I reckon to afford all that and sent to boys to Eton I reckon you would have needed private means in the past (like the Maynard boys had Granny Maynard’s money). Also leads me back to ‘terribly poor ’ Peter Chester with his lack of private means.

Slightly OT, the writer of the article gets a lot of stick (because he writes things like "A headhunter who is often asked by his friends how they are meant to get by on, say, an MP’s salary of £60,000 a year, has no answer."!) as he is still pretty privileged but I can see where he is coming from. He’s not writing about people on the minimum wage or benefits, he’s writing about the rich. (Think of Elizabeth Bennet; she isn’t poor in the sense she has no food but she are poor as far as the book is concerned and she has no money to inherit.) The same job now won’t buy the lifestyle he grew up with. On the other hand we want all the things we grew up with along with mobile phones, ipods and more foreign holidays and new clothes than the previous generation would have dreamed of. Perhaps we are just spending our money on different things. (Will still never afford the million pound house in Chiswick though, let alone Chelsea!)

The other thing I thought when reading this was that kids have never automatically inherited the standard of living they grew up with. Even if you came from a rich family the estate would have gone to the eldest son and the younger would have to make a career in the Church of the Army. Think of Edmund in Mansfield Park. Tom gets the house as the eldest son and Edmund gets to become a clergyman and live in a cottage. I’m sure it was a rather nice cottage but nothing like the country house he grew up in. Hence Mary Crawford’s (potential wife) distain. Similarly a daughter would still need to marry well, assuming she wasn’t getting the house. At the same point in history a daughter might get a fortune of say £20,000. Now that would provide an income of around £1000, a considerable amount but nothing like the £5000 a year the Mr Bingley has and he can afford to buy a country house. You’d still need to marry a Mr Darcy if you wanted a house in the country. I wonder how much was left for the Maynard masses to inherit and just how much Con made out of her writing.

#21: Author: Tara, Location: Malvern, Worcestershire

Posted: Fri May 04, 2007 11:23 pm
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Mrs Redboots wrote:

many children at secondary schools were withdrawn on their 15th (later 16th) birthday and put to work in a shop or on a farm. The culture of staying on into the sixth form and beyond simply didn't exist a generation ago!

I set up the Vocational Sixth Form at my school (our very large local comp.), and initially many students who stayed on were the first generation in their family to have post-16 education, much less University opportunities. Several were expected to make a financial contribution to the family, which meant massive part-time jobs, and I more than once loaned the money for UCAS applications to lads (it always was lads, no idea why!) whose parents expected them to meet the costs themselves. And that was only 10-15years ago.

#22: Author: Mrs Redboots, Location: London, UK

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 9:16 pm
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Tara wrote:

As recent as that?! I knew a girl, some 30 years ago now, who did a 2-year secretarial course which included modern languages and a placement in a Paris firm for six weeks at the end of the course (the young woman in question actually stayed on for a year, as several of them did if given the chance). This particular girl's father was a miner, and she said that his colleagues were all, "What's the likes of you doing with a daughter at college/working in Paris? Tuppence to speak to you now, I suppose!"

And my father-in-law hadn't been allowed to take up a scholarship to a college (this may have been a secondary school, or further education, I'm not totally clear on that), which is an enormous pity as he was an intelligent man! He insisted that his sons had as much education as they could cope with, and I'm sorry he hasn't lived to see four of his grandchildren with degrees, one of whom is working for a PhD, and another at university!

#23: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Sat May 05, 2007 9:23 pm
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My grandad was the dux of his school but wasn't able to stay on past twelve cos the family couldn't afford for him not to be working/to buy the uniform. My grandma left school at twelve too to work but she did night school, went to teacher training college and also did a degree in the OU. They also encouraged their kids to get as much eductaion as possible.

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