Price of new Vickers Wellington
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One perhaps especially relevant converter would be average earnings, since there was a lot of labour in a Wellington. For the war years, average weekly earnings were about GBP200; the same table (on the Measuring Worth website) gives average earnings in 2022 as a smidge over GBP 32,000. So at a cost of GBP 20,000 that would make GBP 3,200,000; at 14,000, 2,240,000. Say, the same as ten of the more modest kind of Ferrari.
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As I understand it, the figures in the Price Books relate to the bare airfrane, and don't include things such as engines, radio, instruments etc. that the Ministry purchased seperately and passed to the airframe manufacturer for incorporation.
Aha, the basic price of 20.000 GBD (indeed, my pc does not have the GBD sign, and the dot is the indication of thousands, i.l.o. of the comma, that some parts of the world use) is without the price of engines and further equipment so the real price would be much higher, as Innominate indicated. But even if engines and equipment would constitute around 1/4 of the airframe cost, it stil seems a very cheap bomber.
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According to https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/mone...ion-calculator £20,000 in 1943 would be £754,872 (and 98p!) in 2024.
Just out of interest, the J class destroyer, Jupiter, 2700 tonnes, commissioned in June 1939 cost £390,000. So far that sum you could (almost) get 20 Wellingtons!
Expatrick; Wellingtons/sea-boots were issued to all ships crews....
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For the war years, average weekly earnings were about GBP200
From the information I have been able to obtain it seems that the minimum rate of pay of a non-tradesman private in the United States Army who is now in the British Isles works out at about 5s. per day. The minimum rate for the similar kind of private in the Canadian Army is 5s. 2d., and in the Australian Army 6s. 9d. The British equivalent receives 2s. 6d.
2s 6d (12.5p) a day is 17s 6d a week - not even £1.
Incidentally, I used to know an RCAF radar mechanic who was posted to Leuchars during the war. He told me that unlike US forces, Canadians were paid the same amount in cash as the equivalent British rank and the balance of their wages was deposited in a Canadian bank account.
I thought it was NLF.
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That has to be a mistake. When looking up WWII wages, I found this quote from 1942 in Hansard:
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-h...itish-army-pay
2s 6d (12.5p) a day is 17s 6d a week - not even £1.
Incidentally, I used to know an RCAF radar mechanic who was posted to Leuchars during the war. He told me that unlike US forces, Canadians were paid the same amount in cash as the equivalent British rank and the balance of their wages was deposited in a Canadian bank account.
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-h...itish-army-pay
2s 6d (12.5p) a day is 17s 6d a week - not even £1.
Incidentally, I used to know an RCAF radar mechanic who was posted to Leuchars during the war. He told me that unlike US forces, Canadians were paid the same amount in cash as the equivalent British rank and the balance of their wages was deposited in a Canadian bank account.
One other element of uncertainty is that the Wellington was a much simpler aircraft than a modern "medium bomber" (even though its structure was rather complicated), and under wartime circumstances there'd have been good economies of scale.
Many years ago I was teaching Anglo-Saxon English here in NZ, and the passage we were reading gave the price of a sheep, in silver coinage, in the 10th century. For kicks and giggles I looked up that day's price of silver and the latest auction prices for sheep, and the cost of a sheep in weight of silver was exactly the same as in the century before the Conquest. Pure fluke, though I enjoyed it, but most comparisons only give a rough equivalence, especially the number of Ferraris you could buy. But maybe how many Morgan three-wheelers you could buy for a Wellington would have the validity of contemporary levels of technology.
That has to be a mistake. When looking up WWII wages, I found this quote from 1942 in Hansard:
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-h...itish-army-pay
2s 6d (12.5p) a day is 17s 6d a week - not even £1.
Incidentally, I used to know an RCAF radar mechanic who was posted to Leuchars during the war. He told me that unlike US forces, Canadians were paid the same amount in cash as the equivalent British rank and the balance of their wages was deposited in a Canadian bank account.
https://api.parliament.uk/historic-h...itish-army-pay
2s 6d (12.5p) a day is 17s 6d a week - not even £1.
Incidentally, I used to know an RCAF radar mechanic who was posted to Leuchars during the war. He told me that unlike US forces, Canadians were paid the same amount in cash as the equivalent British rank and the balance of their wages was deposited in a Canadian bank account.
In 1972 when I qualified as a J/T (junior tech) my wages shot up to approx £25 per week (which was a fair wage in those days).
In 1986 ish - as a civvy in the aircraft industry on a really good week I might get £300 per week.
Perhaps the £200 figure was actually per annum ?
In 1975, working on the shop floor in an engineering company with a bonus system where it was impossible to get less than 100%, I made £65 - £70 a week.
From there I moved to office-based jobs, for considerably less money, and even with inflation raging at 20-odd% through the '70s it was still the very late '80s before I made £200 a week.
I never knew anybody personally who made the official average wage. It always seemed to me to be an astronomical figure,
From there I moved to office-based jobs, for considerably less money, and even with inflation raging at 20-odd% through the '70s it was still the very late '80s before I made £200 a week.
I never knew anybody personally who made the official average wage. It always seemed to me to be an astronomical figure,
I have read somewhere that equipment required for aircraft production was supplied directly to the aircraft builder “free of charge” by the ministry. I am thinking of items such as tyres, magnetos, radios and so forth that were added to the airframe. Thus the cost of these assemblies may not appear in the cost of the aircraft from the builders. Might be quite wrong, but just a thought.
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Correct.
No, it was NLG but only banks used that code. The confusion arises from the fact that a sum in guilders was always written as fl.1000,- with the 'fl.' being the abbreviation for Florijn (Florin) as has been mentioned. An italic f (don't know how to find the symbol these days) was also used. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_guilder
No, it was NLG but only banks used that code. The confusion arises from the fact that a sum in guilders was always written as fl.1000,- with the 'fl.' being the abbreviation for Florijn (Florin) as has been mentioned. An italic f (don't know how to find the symbol these days) was also used. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_guilder
I have read somewhere that equipment required for aircraft production was supplied directly to the aircraft builder “free of charge” by the ministry. I am thinking of items such as tyres, magnetos, radios and so forth that were added to the airframe. Thus the cost of these assemblies may not appear in the cost of the aircraft from the builders. Might be quite wrong, but just a thought.
