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Regional industrial structure and labour force decline in Ireland between 1841 and 1851

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2016

Frank Geary
Frank Geary*
Affiliation:
School of Public Policy, Economics and Law, University of Ulster at Jordanstown
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Extract

The censuses of 1841 and 1851 provide the earliest detailed and consistent data on the occupations pursued by the people of Ireland in the first half of the nineteenth century. This paper presents a series, constructed from this data, on occupations classified by industry for the years 1841 and 1851. Its purpose is to establish the industrial distribution of the labour force for each of the four provinces, to describe the changes in industrial employment by province during the famine decade, and to make a contribution to debate on the origins of employment decline.

I

In its return of occupations, the census of 1841 differed from the censuses of 1821 and 1831 in three ways: in method of estimation, in compilation, and in system of classification. As regards estimation, the 1841 commissioners issued a ‘Form of family return’ to be completed by the head of the family, rather than, as in 1821 and 1831, having the details entered by the enumerator from viva voce inquiry. This has its limitations in that it depends on the accuracy of the householders’ returns, but it is preferable to relying on the accuracy of enumerators’ returns. As regards compilation, the 1841 census returned the occupations of all persons active in the labour force by age and gender; the 1821 census returned all persons active; the 1831 census returned males upwards of twenty years of age in agriculture, industry and services (except servants), all male servants and female servants (age unspecified). As regards the system of classification, the 1821 occupation returns were made under three, and the 1831 under eleven general headings with no return of the numbers engaged in the component occupations of these headings (but see note 1); the 1841 census provided a return of the numbers of males and females engaged in each of 471 occupations classified as belonging to one of nine classes: ministering to food; clothing; lodging; furniture; machinery, etc.; health; charity; justice; education; religion; unclassified.

Type
Research Article
Information
Irish Historical Studies , Volume 30 , Issue 118 , November 1996 , pp. 167 - 194
Copyright
Copyright © Irish Historical Studies Publications Ltd 1996

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References

1 Abstract of answers and returns, pursuant to act 55 Geo. 3, for taking an account of the population of Ireland in 1821, H.C. 1824 (577), xxii; Abstract of the population returns, 1831, H.C. 1833 (634). xxxix (this census made a return at the county level of the number of males upwards of twenty years of age in some 214 occupations grouped under the heading ‘Retail trade or handicraft’); Report of the commissioners appointed to take the census of Ireland for the year 1841 [504], H.C. 1843, xxiv (henceforth 1841 census); Buxton, N.K. and MacKay, D.I., British employment statistics: a guide to sources and methods (Oxford, 1977), ch. 1Google Scholar. The reliability of the pre-Famine censuses has been carefully considered by Lee, J.J., ‘On the accuracy of pre-Famine censuses’ in Goldstrom, Max and Clarkson, L.A., Irish population, economy and society: essays in honour of K. H. Connell (Oxford, 1981), pp 37–56 Google Scholar.

2 The census of Ireland for the year 1851, pt vi: General report [2134], H.C. 1856, xxxi (henceforth 1851 census).

3 An industry is a group of units of production which have some common characteristics: the textiles and leather industries, for example, are defined by their raw materials, and clothing and construction industries by their end products. An industrial classification establishes labour force structure by industry, such as construction, textiles or shipbuilding rather than by occupation, such as manager, clerk or self-employed.

4 Lee, C.H., British regional employment statistics, 1841–1971 (Cambridge, 1979)Google Scholar.

5 Lee, Employment statistics, pp 18–24, has provided a list of the component occupations which make up the main orders of his series. There is also an appendix to the 1911 census of England and Wales which provides a classified list of occupations giving the order, sub-order and heading in which each occupation should be located (Census returns of England and Wales, 1911, vol. x: Appendix: Classified and alphabetical list of occupations and the rules adopted for classification [Cd 7660], H.C. 1914–16, lxxxi).

6 Armstrong, W.A., ‘The use of information about occupations’ in Wrigley, E.A., Nineteenth-century society: essays in the use of quantitative methods for the study of social data (Cambridge, 1972)Google Scholar; Deane, Phyllis and Cole, W.A., British economic growth, 1688–1959 (2nd ed., Cambridge, 1967), ch. 4Google Scholar; Lee, Employment statistics, ch. 1.

7 Deane & Cole, British economic growth, pp 136–7.

8 Geary, Frank, ‘Deindustrialisation in Ireland to 1851: some evidence from the census’, Economic and Social Research Institute Working Paper 68 (1996), pp 7–11 Google Scholar.

9 Lee, Employment statistics, p. 11, points out that it was a problem also encountered by the census commissioners of England and Wales and Scotland particularly in the decades preceding 1881.

10 1841 census, p. xxi, 21.

10 1851 census, p. xxxix, 39.

12 Lee, Employment statistics, p. 8; Taylor, F.D.W., ‘United Kingdom: numbers in agriculture’ in Farm Economist, viii (1955), p. 37 Google Scholar; Feinstein, C.H., National income, expenditure and output of the United Kingdom, 1855–1965 (Cambridge, 1972), p. 224 (esp. n. 2)Google Scholar.

13 Taylor, ‘United Kingdom: numbers in agriculture’, p. 37; Bellerby, J.R., ‘The distribution of manpower in agriculture and industry, 1851–1951‘ in Farm Economist, ix 1958), pp 1–11 Google Scholar; Lee, Employment statistics, p. 12; Feinstein, National income, expenditure & output, pp 223–4;. For a dissenting view as regards agriculture see Higgs, Edward, ‘Occupational censuses and the agricultural workforce in Victorian England and Wales’ in Econ. Hist. Rev., xlviii 1995), pp 700–16 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 Taylor, ‘United Kingdom; numbers in agriculture’, p. 38; Geary, Frank and Stark, Tom,’Examining Ireland’s post-Famine economic performance: the distribution of gross domestic product between the countries of the United Kingdom, 1861–1911’, Economic and Social Research Insitute Working Paper 71 (1996), pp 9–11 Google Scholar.

15 For a discussion of the problems with the return of female occupations in 1871 see Geary & Stark, ‘Examining Ireland’s post-Famine economic performance’, pp7-13.

16 1841 census, p. xx, 20.

17 Lee, Employment statistics, p. 5.

18 Geary, ’Deindustrialisation in Ireland to 1851’.

19 The sector ‘other manufacturing’ shows a small net gain of 0.3 thousand jobs. This obscures the loss of 0.6 thousand jobs in engineering, 0.2 thousand in vehicles, and 2.1 thousand jobs in timber and furniture.

20 The growth accounting technique is set out in Mathews, R.C.O., Feinstein, C.H. and Odling-Smee, J.C., British economic growth, 1856–1973 (Oxford, 1982), p. 55 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. These calculations are only a very rough guide to the importance of these factors. The calculation was based on only four groups: males and females aged 0 to 15 and males and females aged 15 and over; a more disaggregated set of age groups might produce different outcomes (see Mathews et al., op. cit., p. 625 n. 15).

21 Almquist, E.L.,’Labour specialisation and the Irish economy in 1841: an aggregate occupational analysis’ in Econ. Hist. Rev., xxxvi 1983), pp 506–17 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 The coefficient of localisation for textiles in 1841 is measured as either [Ulster (0.57−0.32)] + [Connacht (0.19−0.17)] = +0.26 or [Munster (0.14−0.27)] + [Leinster (0.11−0.24)] = −0.26. See Lee, C.H. Regional growth in the United Kingdom since 1880 (London, 1981), pp 222–3 Google Scholar. For any industry, if each province had a share of employment which matched its share of total employment, the coefficient would have the value zero; the highest possible value would occur if all of employment in an industry was concentrated in the province with the smallest share of the total workforce. In 1841 this was Connacht, which would give a highest possible value of 0.83.

23 For example, Ulster had 57 per cent of textile jobs and 32 per cent of the employed population. Thus Ulster’s location quotient for textiles is 57/32 = 1.78.

24 Perloff, H.S., Edgar, S.D., Lampard, E.E. and Muth, R.F., Regions, resources and economic growth (Baltimore, 1960), pp 33–4 Google Scholar.

25 Ibid., pp 70–74.

26 For example, the economy-wide growth in employment in agriculture was −0.212, and in food was 0.369. Thus for Ulster the differential shift for agriculture was 478.3 thousand × −0.212 = −101.4 thousand, and for food was 1.7 × 0.369 = 3.4 thousand. The sum of the shifts for each industry in Ulster gives the differential shift in Ulster.

27 The coefficient of correlation across counties between spinners unspecified and wool-spinners returned in 1841 is 0.033, which is not significantly different from zero. Between spinners unspecified and flax-spinners it is 0.859, which is significant at the 0.001 level.

28 Reports of the inspectors of factories for the half year ending 31st October 1852, pp 36–8 [1580], H.C. 1852–3, xl, 496–8; Labour department (employment of women): report by Miss Collet on changes in the employment of women and girls, pt 1: Flax and jute centres, pp 40–46 [C. 8794], H.C. 1898, lxxxviii, 348–54 (henceforth Miss Collet’s report).

29 The organisation and development of the fancy and plain sewing trade in the mid-century and after has been examined in Collins, Brenda, ‘Sewing and social structure: the flowerers of Scotland and Ireland’ in Mitchison, Rosalind and Roebuck, Peter (eds), Economy and society in Scotland and Ireland, 1500–1939 (Edinburgh, 1988), pp 242–54 Google Scholar.

30 McCall, Hugh, Ireland and her staple manufactures (3rd ed., Belfast, 1870), p. 397 Google Scholar, states that there were 245,000 spindles in Ireland in 1840. This figure seems likely to be an overestimate, since it implies about 27 spindles per employee in 1840 compared with around 18.8 for Ireland as a whole in 1850, according to the factory inspectors (Return of the number of cotton, woollen, worsted, flax and silk factories subject to the factory acts in each county distinguishing each description of factory … with a general summary, p. 11, H.C. 1850 (745), xlii, 465; Miss Collet’s report, p. 48, 356).

31 Note that the highest possible value for the coefficient of localisation is now 0.86 (see note 22).

32 O’Rourke, Kevin, ‘Did the Great Irish Famine matter?’ in Jn. Econ. Hist., li 1991), pp 1–22 Google Scholar.

33 These arguments are reviewed in detail in O’Rourke, Kevin, ’Agricultural change and rural depopulation: Ireland, 1845–1876’ (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, Harvard University, 1989), pp 74–95 Google Scholar.

34 Geary, ’Deindustrialisation in Ireland to 1851’; Cullen, L.M., An economic history of Ireland since 1660 (London, 1972), pp 124, 144Google Scholar.

35 Miss Collet’s report, p. 48, 356.

36 Reports of the inspectors of factories for the quarter ending 30 September 1844, and from 1 October 1844 to 30 April 1845; with appendix, p. 9 [C. 639], H.C. 1845, xxv, 439.

37 Bowley, A.L., ‘Statistics of wages in the United Kingdom during the last 100 years, Part III: Agricultural wages in Ireland’ in R. Stat. Soc. Jn., lxii (1899), pp 395–404 Google Scholar; idem, ‘Statistics of wages in the United Kingdom during the last 100 years, Part IV: Agricultural wages — concluded. Earnings and general averages’, ibid., pp 555–70.

38 Sixth annual report of the commissioners for administering the laws for the relief of the poor in Ireland; with appendices, pp 151–6 [1645], H.C. 1852–3, 1, Appendix B: Tables, no. xvi, pp 317–22.

39 Formally, zero correlation and statistical independence are not the same thing. Nevertheless, independent variables have zero correlation; the argument here is that the weight of the evidence suggests that on balance the events ‘blight’ and ‘innovation of the wet-flax process’ are independent.

40 Cullen, Economic history of Ireland, p. 134.

41 Gráda, Cormac Ó, The Great Irish Famine (London, 1989), p. 76 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; idem, Ireland before and after the Famine: explorations in economic history, 1800–1930 (2nd ed., Mancester, 1993), chs 1,3.

42 Gráda, Cormac Ó, Ireland: a new economic history (Oxford, 1994), p. 185 Google Scholar.

43 The data on Irish occupations in 1841 and 1851 were kindly supplied to me in spreadsheet format by the Database of Irish Historical Statistics at Queen’s University, Belfast. My particular thanks go to Margaret Crawford and Elaine Yates for their unfailing helpfulness. I should also like to thank Leslie Clarkson, Mary Daly and Pat McGregor for helpful comments and discussions. The errors are mine.