Closest Wealth Converter?

[Taylor94]

Hello
I'm just wanting peoples opinions on the old Money converters out there when trying to convert money in the 1500s/1600s/1700s into todays money.
I've been converting money from Inventories and land deeds but I notice that there are 3 sites which all put out a slightly different amount?
For instance
Inventory wealth from 1750
£725-18-2-2

National archives converter using and I quote - 'data from records such as those of the royal household and Exchequer. These documents may record large purchases by government institutions rather than ordinary retail prices, and wages of skilled craftsmen rather than the general level of earnings' gives the sum as £84,691.14 in todays money.
According to the Bank of Englands inflation converter which uses national statistics from 1750 onwards and a cost of living index prior to 1750 gives the same sum as £157,907.84 in todays money.
The last converter is Measuringworth.com and has a number of Comparatives.
The relative real wage or real wealth value of this sum today is £108,500.00 but also gives these other answers -
the relative labour earnings of the income or wealth - £1,357,000.00
the relative income value of that income or wealth - £1,700,000.00
the relative output value of that income or wealth - £14,640,000.0
 
I may be missing something obvious and I know these give a roudabout figure but which would be the closest in terms of value/wealth?

[Guy Etchells]

Hello
I'm just wanting peoples opinions on the old Money converters out there when trying to convert money in the 1500s/1600s/1700s into todays money.
I've been converting money from Inventories and land deeds but I notice that there are 3 sites which all put out a slightly different amount?
For instance
Inventory wealth from 1750
£725-18-2-2

National archives converter using and I quote - 'data from records such as those of the royal household and Exchequer. These documents may record large purchases by government institutions rather than ordinary retail prices, and wages of skilled craftsmen rather than the general level of earnings' gives the sum as £84,691.14 in todays money.
According to the Bank of Englands inflation converter which uses national statistics from 1750 onwards and a cost of living index prior to 1750 gives the same sum as £157,907.84 in todays money.
The last converter is Measuringworth.com and has a number of Comparatives.
The relative real wage or real wealth value of this sum today is £108,500.00 but also gives these other answers -
the relative labour earnings of the income or wealth - £1,357,000.00
the relative income value of that income or wealth - £1,700,000.00
the relative output value of that income or wealth - £14,640,000.0
 
I may be missing something obvious and I know these give a roudabout figure but which would be the closest in terms of value/wealth?

It is not really possible to convert value/wealth over such long periods of time there are too many variables.
If you take a selection of such convertors you may find a difference of tens of thousands of pounds over the range.

I would suggest a better way is to judge value or wealth in each individual time period for instance by comparing wages for different groups of people in one year.

Cheers
Guy

[Taylor94]

I had been wondering this but a few people suggested awhile back that it was possible to get a rough estimation of Wealth based on inflation,
Along with the inventory there are a wage payments for what appears to be half a years wage at 2-12-6 and 1-10-0 for who I assume are farm hands and 1-10-0 for labourers thrashing 20 Quarters of corn. Then 2 similar payments for Housemaid/Nurses.

In 1743, In regards to amounts, £30,000 was regarded as a vast sum according to the research and lendings of Mr Andrews to the Prince of Wales (Subject of the Gainsborough paintings) This sum of £30,000,00 was the converted amount.

[stanmapstone]

The British Association for Local History produce a booklet called "How Much is that Worth?" by Lionel Mumby. In the introduction it says "No single precise, numerical answer is possible to the question: what is the modern value of a given sum of money at a particular time in the past? We do know the monetary price of many distinct items at specific times, but we cannot easily generalise from these prices."

This has been asked many times before see Value of old Money in the RootsChat Reference Library http://surname.rootschat.com/lexicon/reflib-lexicon.php?letter=V&lang=EN&input_form=0

Stan

[Mart 'n' Al]

Over the years I have often wondered how to compare 'a dime a dozen' and 'ten a penny' .  I can vaguely remember when £1 was equal to $2.40, a US cent equivalent to a UK penny, so it has changed over the last 50-60 years.

Martin

[Taylor94]

Thank you for this.
I've taken into account the wage payments given on the Estate expenses at the time of death.
This is refering to Richard Dudley, Gent of Cosby, Leic
£2 is given as a half years wage (At least I think that says 1/2 or is it just 2 years? I'll attach a snippet) and £1.10.0 for an unknown amount of workers thrashing 20 Quarters of Corn.
So if say £2 was roughly the average half yearly wage of a farm labourer or labourer in general, an inventory sum of £725.18.2 must be a fairly substantial sum. Richards grt grandfather according to court records in 1657 had a estate sum of £2,000 which must have been a vast sum at the time.