An excellent resource.

[ysobelle]

Jane Eyre was left £20,000 by her uncle John when he died in Madeira. Interestingly, this is exactly the same amount Mr. Rochester says he is worth earlier in the novel. But how much is that, exactly?

According to this excellent site, http://measuringworth.com/calculators/ppoweruk/, the poor, plain, little governess is suddenly worth:

£1,312,699.13 using the retail price index
£1,929,009.40 using the GDP deflator
£14,282,869.60 using average earnings
£20,838,748.88 using per capita GDP
£47,622,772.04 using the GDP

Fairly staggering, even considering she then gave 3/4 of it away to be shared equally with her newly-discovered cousins, Diana, Mary, and St. John Rivers.

For a fuller discussion of what this means, also see this excellent article on relative worth at the same site: http://www.measuringworth.com/worthmeasures.html

Comments

[kylecassidy.livejournal.com]

was this during a time of crappy exchange rate with the u.s. or "omfg, i'm buying a corvette in the states cause it costs like ten pea there" exchagne rate times?

[ysobelle.livejournal.com]

Snerk!

1840, sir.