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Facts about Britain at work in the Fifties

The postwar years were a period of great change in the working lives of many Britons, as the BBC Two Documentary, The British at Work, explored.

A street in Birmingham in the 1950s.
A street in Birmingham in the 1950s.

1. At the outbreak of the Second World War, two million women were still employed in domestic service. Wages were still only 25p a week.

2. In the late Forties, the typical manual labourer in Britain was entitled to just one week's paid holiday a year.

3. In the decade following the Second World War, more than 70 per cent of British workers were in manual labour.

4. In 1950, the average UK annual salary was just over £100.

5. In the 1950s, 1.5million women in Britain worked as either secretaries or typists.

6. It was only after the Second World War that it became the norm in Britain to work five days a week rather than six.

7. In the 1950s, the low average rates of unemployment (around 3 per cent) did not include the majority of women, who were considered "economically inactive".

8. The numbers of mothers in employment has tripled since 1951.