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INDUSTRY STRUCTURE AND INCOME
OPPORTUNITIES FOR HOUSEHOLDS IN
CLASSICAL ATHENS
Peter Acton
The standard of living in Classical Athens was high by comparison with almost
any other society until recent times, and wealth was more evenly distrib-
uted than in many societies.^1 By the Classical period the basic daily wage was
around six times subsistence requirements, and half of Athens’ population lived
a life that would have been described in the eighteenth century as ‘decent or
middling’ in Holland and better than the typical Briton.^2 This advanced life-
style was manifest in various ways: 10,000 people at a time could attend the
theatre in Athens; by contrast, in eighteenth century England only 1 percent
of the population ever visited a theatre in their lives. Most importantly, it was
manifest in manufactures.
Between subsistence and post-industrial societies, differences in living stan-dards relate largely to the consumption of manufactured goods. Humans have
always been willing to trade resources for personal comforts like grooming, sex
or entertainment, but once these have become available at affordable prices in
the quantities people want them, marginal expenditure tends to be on manu-
factured products up to the point, late in modern history, where advanced
societies are sufficiently satisfied with material possessions to seek additional
services with their extra resources instead. Athens was rich in the raw materi-
als of culture including marble, limestone, clay and silver, and trading partners
provided other luxury items such as fine cloth, spices, dyestuffs and precious
This chapter draws on the analysis and conclusions of Acton 2014.