Quote:
Originally Posted by Anthony
The normal flow for a low tech status 0 is that a young adult male will either be married and supporting a family, or will be saving up so he can do so. This requires the cost of living for a single person to be not more than about 50% of gross income.
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I think it may work differently. Here you have a young single man. He can do the work of his job, whether farming, a craft, or buying and selling. But he doesn't really have the time to cook his meals, wash and mend his clothes, clean his living space, and so on. Nor, in all probability, does he have the skills. (See Terry Pratchett's bit about the Seamstresses' Guild getting visits from men who want the comforts provided by a wife, such as a mended shirt.)
So, for example, he buys cooked food, and pays more for it than he would for the raw materials that his wife could turn into cooked food, if he has a wife.
In GURPS terms, I'm using the crude approximation that Cost of Living for Status 0 supports either a wife and family, or a staff of servants who can maintain a household, or a room in a boarding house that provides most meals and simple domestic services. The true cost of living as a single man is probably less than 100% of the cost to support a family, but could easily be more than 50% in premodern times without microwaves, dishwashers, food processors, hair driers, and the like.