Page:Lectures on Housing.djvu/18

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6
SATISFACTORY HOUSES FOR WORKING CLASSES

fewer, to the acre, with a parlour, a little hall or passage, a living room, a scullery behind that, and three bedrooms, with occasionally a bathroom. Probably from ten to twenty per cent. of our workers are living in these houses. They are sanitary, and as a rule, fairly well planned—sometimes extremely well planned—so far as their interior arrangements are concerned; but generally speaking, they also are built in long rows. They often have a little front garden, a bow window, and a large backyard or a small garden behind.

Such are housing conditions among our workers to-day. Although they leave so much to be desired, the working classes pay a huge proportion of their income in rent.

It is about fourteen years since I investigated the facts in York, but I very much doubt whether they would be materially different to-day.

Taking the families whose total income—not merely the income of the chief wage-earner—was between 20s. and 30s., I found