Comparison of tool prices over time.

[Paddy Roxburgh]

There has been some discussion on another thread about how we can compare prices of tools over time. In short are LN and the like more expensive than Stanley were 50 years ago? This post is an attempt to collect some data on this question. So to older forum members, do you remember buying your tools 50 years ago? Do you remember how much they cost? Do you remember how much you were earning and how much more experienced craftsmen were earning at this time?
Also I know some of you have a lot of knowledge and sources about the prices old tools and the wages of craftsmen for a much longer period than 50 years, I would be really interested to hear some of this information.
My gut feeling is that todays premium tools are not really more expensive than Stanley and record were if compared to a craftsmen's income, they just seem expensive because of the ever falling prices of consumer goods, however my gut feeling is of very little worth.
I look forward to your replies
Paddy

 

[MIGNAL]

Someone recently scanned a catalogue page from 1960 that showed a Stanley No. 4 as being £2.
The average weekly wage from that year is given as being near £12. Even if these figures are out by a significant margin it still suggests that a LN is relatively expensive. I expect a LN No.4 to represent near 50% of a craftsmans weekly wage today. If you are self employed it could be 980%.

 

[Paddy Roxburgh]

£2 would have been roughly one days wages, comparable to quangsheng in pricing (but not LN)

 

[Trafalgar]

If Stanley was getting the equivalent of today's L-N prices for its Bailey line, especially given production levels, it is one of the most stunning feats in the history of capitalism.

I'm open to the notion. Let me see the math.

 

[MIGNAL]

The LN is near 2 1/2 days pay, assuming it's £240. I suppose it's difficult to gauge the Quangsheng, largely because it's manufactured in a country with relatively low wage and manufacturing costs. Hard to do comparisons of tools in 1960 and today when there has been such a sea change. Taking it as a straight measure though we are enjoying a greater quality tool for a similar 'price'.

 

[Trafalgar]

2.5 days' pay for whom?

 

[Sporky McGuffin]

I expect a LN No.4 to represent near 50% of a craftsmans weekly wage today.

Pretty much bang on from a quick Google.

LN no4 from Axminster - £231.28
Average weekly wage for a carpenter - £462.09

http://www.axminster.co.uk/lie-nielsen- ... hing-plane
http://www.icalculator.info/news/UK_ave ... _2014.html

 

[Trafalgar]

Here, the word carpenter means a worker who be highly unlikely to use a hand plane in their work at all.

Is this a meaningful comparison in the UK? I don't know.

 

[RogerP]

The answers are probably all here if you have the time and will to read it. I haven't.

Average Earnings and Retail Prices, UK, 1209-2010
http://www.measuringworth.com/datasets/ukearncpi/earnstudynew.pdf

 

[custard]

One of the many complexities when it comes to measuring inflation is that the quality of the goods or services that we buy rarely remain the same in quality terms. They generally improve and occasionally they fall, but they're rarely constant. If you look up hedonics or hedonic regression you can read far more about it than you ever wanted to know.

A 1960's Stanley plane was pretty close to the post-war low point in tool quality, where as a current LN plane is approaching the high point.

We could all happily squabble for the rest of the day about the fine details of that assertion, but it's undeniable that it has quite a bearing on the issue! Personally I'd argue a 1960's Stanley and a current LN are so far apart in quality terms that it's no longer meaningful to compare them in price terms.

 

[Sporky McGuffin]

Here, the word carpenter means a worker who be highly unlikely to use a hand plane in their work at all.

Is this a meaningful comparison in the UK? I don't know.

You could look it up and find out.

Or you could see if there's a more appropriate occupation listed at that link.

Or you could investigate average UK wages for skilled woodworkers.

There are many, many ways you could contribute positively to the thread.

 

[Trafalgar]

One of the many complexities when it comes to measuring inflation is that the quality of the goods or services that we buy rarely remain the same in quality terms. They generally improve and occasionally they fall, but they're rarely constant. If you look up hedonics or hedonic regression you can read far more about it than you ever wanted to know.

A 1960's Stanley plane was pretty close to the post-war low point in tool quality, where as a current LN plane is approaching the high point.

We could all happily squabble for the rest of the day about the fine details of that assertion, but it's undeniable that it has quite a bearing on the issue! Personally I'd argue a 1960's Stanley and a current LN are so far apart in quality terms that it's no longer meaningful to compare them in price terms.

Why pick 1960? Probably ought to pick Bedrocks from one of the better production years, a few years after they came out for instance.

And I think the whole bit about a % of a workers wages is a variable you don't need. If somebody only uses a plane 10% a week then their outlook on planes generally would be vastly different from the fellow from the 1930s who may have used his for a much higher percentage of time. In this example, the plane as a percentage of a weeks' wages is not an appropriate measure of much at all. If you use a screwdriver all day you might be interested in owning really nice screwdrivers. If you drive five screws in an entire day you probably couldn't care less about the quality, and the measurement or evaluation of the 'willingness' to part with X-days' worth of pay to own nice screwdrivers is meaningless.

 

[Corneel]

This kind of stuff is very difficult to compare because of the vastly different culture now and then. Just a pant of the seat feeling: I have way more disposable income then my parents when they were young or my grand parents. I have a lot more money to spend on "toys" then they had. That's partly because prices for stuff we need for our daily existence are very low nowadays. So, even when the price of a modern handplane would be rather high, I have more money available to indulge.

 

[matthewwh]

Perhaps going back and comparing with the original 60... series bedrocks might provide a more valid comparison?

Anyone got a copy of Melhuish?

Here's another source for wage rates that might provide some insight:

http://www.wirksworth.org.uk/A04value.htm

It's building crafts, so would include bricklayers, chippies, leadworkers etc, but it does give us a breakdown of labour vs skilled and covers a large time range.

 

[custard]

And I think the whole bit about a % of a workers wages is a variable you don't need. If somebody only uses a plane 10% a week then their outlook on planes generally would be vastly different from the fellow from the 1930s who may have used his for a much higher percentage of time. In this example, the plane as a percentage of a weeks' wages is not an appropriate measure of much at all. If you use a screwdriver all day you might be interested in owning really nice screwdrivers. If you drive five screws in an entire day you probably couldn't care less about the quality, and the measurement or evaluation of the 'willingness' to part with X-days' worth of pay to own nice screwdrivers is meaningless.

Good point.

 

[MIGNAL]

What difference does that make? Someone today can use their LN for 5 minutes per day (some probably do!), just as someone in 1960 may have used his Stanley for 5 minutes per day.
I thought we were comparing a craftsmen wage (i.e. a pro woodworker) in relation to the cost of his tools, 50 years ago and the present day. The assumption, by the OP, being that cost of tools has become cheaper over the years.

 

[Trafalgar]

I think it matters.

If the assertion being made is that the L-N is the equivalent in price to Stanley Bailey at a particular point in time, and we acknowledge the fact that workers very commonly owned Stanley Bailey, then I guess we need to reconcile the perception (fact?) that Lie-Nielsen is an 'aspirational' brand (Derek's very lovely term) and they are perceived to be a boutique firm (which they are and Stanley certainly was not) with boutique-like prices to match (which seems to be the general consensus).

Otherwise, sump'n don't gee-haw.

One must also reconcile all the Bailey copyists. I think we counted a couple-dozen or more in a past thread and I'm sure a few were left out. Can you imagine two dozen plus Norris copyists? It's absurd. The market could never have absorbed this many copyists of a plane that is being asserted was as premium as Lie-Nielsen is today (Bailey, that is).

If the assertion is that Stanley Bailey was as premium a brand then (with prices to match), as Lie-Nielsen appears to be today, then it's difficult to reconcile this assertion with Stanley's production and sales numbers. One cannot sell and the market cannot absorb as many Rolls Royce cars as Pintos.

I'm sure L-N would love to understand the market mechanics behind Stanley selling orders of magnitudes more planes if the brand perception and pricing schemes were essentially identical. Even allowing for the mechanization of woodworking there's a huge difference.

 

[matthewwh]

Indeed.

You could also spin the same argument around and draw conclusions about how many hours work people were prepared to exchange for a specific tool and therefore how much they valued them.

I recall reading a similar discussion about Norris planes that had them coming out at several months wages, this would tally with the fact that some retailers offered credit terms on them.

 

[Paddy Roxburgh]

Firstly I'm not asserting anything, I'm trying to get some data on which to base an opinion. I know this might seem weird to you Charles but I am quite comfortable not having an opinion when I don't have enough information to base it on.
Secondly, I don't see any other way to asses real prices than to compare an item to income. My father bought his house in 1970, the year I was born, in East London for just over twice his annual income, now it would cost 15 to 20 times the income of someone in the same job. It's fair to say that in London my lifetime has seen massive house price inflation. Clothing on the other hand is much cheaper than it was. One hours work can buy me four pairs of jeans from tesco whereas a pair of cheap jeans even 30 years ago cost nearly a days wages. It really is irrelevant whether I will wear those jeans or live in the house, some things cost more and some cost less. A cheap silverline plane is definitely cheaper in relative terms than an old stanley was. My question was are LNs considerably more expensive than an old stanley, certainly from Mignal's answer in 1960 a stanley was considerably cheaper than a LN priced nearer to a QS.

 

[matthewwh]

Sorry, that wasn't what Charles's post said when I said 'indeed' to it. We seem to have cross posted / edited.

In either case there were a range of tools available in any given time period, but comparing them at purchasing power parity (which is effectively what we are trying to achieve by expressing it in terms of hours worked) you can still draw conclusions.

If a Stanley cost a days wages or thereabouts in 1960 and an LN costs two and a half days wages now, does a current equivalent Stanley cost around 40% of the price of a £230 LN?

No, it's about £40

So Stanleys have fallen in price by about 60% (holding a days wages as a datum point) and LN's are 2.3 times the price that a Stanley would be now had everything else remained constant.

The numbers broadly agree with our experience that Stanley have achieved phenomenal progress in making their tools cheaper, and by so doing have exposed a gap at the top of the market into which LN, Quangsheng, LV and Clifton have successfully moved.

Has anyone bought a new Stanley (standard model) recently that could comment on whether the quality is consistent with the tools they were making in the 1960's?