Census Figures (1882-1907) One of the most striking developments in Wilhelmine Germany was the growing importance of the industrial workplace. These census figures show a decline in the number of independent producers and a rise in the number of workers in large-scale production. An increase in the number of "white collar" workers, including clerks and office assistants, can also be seen.
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page 1 of 1 Gainfully Employed Persons and their Family Members by Occupation (in thousands) (7) Economic Sector Year Self-Employed (a) Salaried Employees (8) (b) Workers (8) (c) Toal Women Total Women Total Women (9) Number % Number % Number % A. Agriculture (1,9) 1882 2,288 277 12.1 67 6 8.8 5,882 2,252 38.3 1895 2,569 347 13.5 96 18 18.8 5,628 2,388 42.4 1907 2,501 328 13.1 99 16 16.5 7,283 4,254 58.4 B. Industry (2) 1882 2,201 579 26.3 99 2 2.3 4,096 545 13.3 1895 2,062 519 25.2 264 9 3.5 5,956 992 16.7 1907 1,977 477 24.1 686 64 9.3 8,593 1,563 18.2 C.Trade and Commerce (3,8) 1882 702 151 21.5 142 3 2.2 727 144 19.9 1895 844 203 24.0 262 12 4.6 1,233 365 29.6 1907 1,012 247 24.4 506 80 15.8 1,960 605 30.9 Total A. to C. (4) 1882 5,191 1,007 19.4 307 11 3.7 10,705 2,941 27.5 1895 5,474 1,069 19.5 622 39 6.3 12,817 3,745 29.2 1907 5,490 1,052 19.0 1,291 160 12.4 17,836 6,422 36.0 1) Includes gardening, animal raising, forestry, and fishing. 2) Includes mining, construction, and trades. 3) Includes restaurants and taverns. 4) Domestics who live in or outside their employer’s household (including those engaged in various types of wage labor). For a definition, see Statistik des Deutschen Reichs [Statistics of the German Reich], 202 (1907), p. 117. The number of persons engaged in various types of wage labor stood at 235,506 in 1882, at 200,919 in 1895, and at 155,696 in 1907. 5) Including church and municipal administration. 6) Includes individuals living off their own assets, pensions, and subsidies, inmates of various kinds of charitable institutions; school-age children, students, and wards living outside of their families; persons without an occupation and without any occupational information. 7) In the individual occupation categories A, B, and C, gainfully employed persons are divided into (a) self-employed, including executive civil servants and other kinds of business managers (owner, proprietor, co-owner or co-proprietor, lessee, hereditary lessee, master tradesmen, entrepreneur, director, administrator). (b) non-executive civil servants, and in general the scientifically, technically, or commercially trained administrative and supervisory personnel, as well as accounting and office personnel. (c) other assistants, apprentices, factory, wage, and day laborers, including family members and domestics working in the trades. (d) family members without a regular occupation and who do not live in other households. The allocation is done according to the primary occupation and social standing of the gainfully employed person who provides the support and in whose household the individual lives. 8) According to estimates by the present authors [Hohorst, et. al.], the occupational category “worker“ included 166,000 sales clerks (of which approx. 32,000 were women) in 1882, 268,868 (81,838 women) in 1895 (according to Statistik des Deutschen Reichs, vol. 111), and 406,385 (173,611 women) in 1907 (according to Statistik des Deutschen Reichs, vol. 203), who, in modern terms, should be counted among salaried employees. – In sector B, foremen were still counted among workers in 1882, after 1895 among salaried employees. 9) Especially in the category Agriculture (A), the “helping family members“ – almost entirely women – are incompletely recorded in the statistics of 1882 and 1895. As a result, the surge in the share of female workers from 33.2% to 46.5% of gainfully employed individuals in agriculture between 1895 and 1907 was caused entirely by a change in the definition of “gainful” employment. According to Hoffmann, Das Wachstum der deutschen Wirtschaft [The Growth of the Germany Economy], pp. 182-84, 210, if one applies the recording methods of 1907, there were already 3,935,000 women employed in agriculture in 1882, and 4,153,000 in 1895. For trade and the restaurant business (part of C), Hoffmann, thanks to a better counting of helping family members, arrives at a much higher figure, especially of female workers. By contrast, deviations from the official statistics are substantially fewer in Industry and Mining (B). If we use the figures of Hoffmann (pp. 205,210), which correct the official statistics, the share of female workers among the total number of the gainfully employed was: 1882 – 35.91%; 1895 – 34.86%; 1907 – 34.88%. Source: Gerd Hohorst, Jürgen Kocka, and Gerhard A. Ritter, eds., Sozialgeschichtliches Arbeitsbuch: Materialien zur Statistik des Kaiserreichs 1870-1914 [Social History Workbook: Materials on Kaiserreich Statistics 1870-1914]. Munich, 1975, vol. 2, p. 67-68. The statistics were compiled by the editors and drawn from the following sources: (for 1882) Statistik des Deutschen Reichs [Statistics of the German Reich], new version, vol. 2 (1884) and new version vol. 4, 3 (1884); (for 1895) Statistik des Deutschen Reichs, new version, vol. 111 (1899); and (for 1907) Statistik des Deutschen Reichs, vol. 203 (1910). Translation: Thomas Dunlap
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