Items of Interest for future study
This takes a look at writers and how they were tied to craftsmen, who had them write trade manuals etc.. for money. Often keeping the writers afloat financially and thus allowing their work to become more well known.
The personal connections of writers with trade have been well established--
Drayton’s father was a tanner or butcher, Christopher Marlowe’s,
a cobbler, Thomas Kyd’s, a scrivener, George Peele’s, a slater,
Munday’s, a draper, John Webster’s, a merchant taylor, Stow’s, a tallow
chandler, Henry Chettle’s, a dyer, Robert Herrick’s, a goldsmith,
Henry Lok and Barnabe Barnes’s, mercers—and writers took care of
such links.-- Sullivan
The personal connections of writers with trade have been well established--
Drayton’s father was a tanner or butcher, Christopher Marlowe’s,
a cobbler, Thomas Kyd’s, a scrivener, George Peele’s, a slater,
Munday’s, a draper, John Webster’s, a merchant taylor, Stow’s, a tallow
chandler, Henry Chettle’s, a dyer, Robert Herrick’s, a goldsmith,
Henry Lok and Barnabe Barnes’s, mercers—and writers took care of
such links.-- Sullivan
The Math of the Renaissance and Today.
The day’s work directly correlates better of the two.
The Oates and Baumol article introduce the idea of a lower daily wage and calculate that the average daily wage of a worker in the Elizabethan Era was being paid the equivalent of 40$ a day(American dollars 1970)
This wage today would consist of 216$ dollars a day, however the average American worker makes, 153$ a day US, so losing that large of a percentage of your income must have some effect on theater patronage.
A second contention has to do with the cost of a basic basket of food, Oates and Company say that the cost of food was so much higher that they actually only made about two dollars a day after purchasing weekly goods.
This is an additional reason offered as to why making money is such a challenge. "Live performance is a labor-intensive activity. Today some 30 percent of the budget of a Broadway play is devoted to the wages of the actors and musicians, and, when one includes payment to the author, to stagehands, carpenters, and the like, the figure is probably over 50 percent"
The Oates and Baumol article introduce the idea of a lower daily wage and calculate that the average daily wage of a worker in the Elizabethan Era was being paid the equivalent of 40$ a day(American dollars 1970)
This wage today would consist of 216$ dollars a day, however the average American worker makes, 153$ a day US, so losing that large of a percentage of your income must have some effect on theater patronage.
A second contention has to do with the cost of a basic basket of food, Oates and Company say that the cost of food was so much higher that they actually only made about two dollars a day after purchasing weekly goods.
This is an additional reason offered as to why making money is such a challenge. "Live performance is a labor-intensive activity. Today some 30 percent of the budget of a Broadway play is devoted to the wages of the actors and musicians, and, when one includes payment to the author, to stagehands, carpenters, and the like, the figure is probably over 50 percent"