gender and poverty

Gender is a very significant factor in the early modern period of England, especially relating to poverty. Their experiences help us understand to what extent life was like living in poverty. Other factors that also contribute to the experiences of poverty such as, geographical locations, age and population, are all underlying factor of gender and poverty. By this I mean, gender was a big issue in the early modern era, regardless of age which may have some affect too, gender was still deemed to be more significant to experiences of poverty; it affected their employment, wages, health (women are more likely to die after giving birth and men are more likely to catch illnesses due to working in terrible conditions) and their chances of mobility. In early modern society, there was a hierarchical system that was thought to be ‘natural’; people believed your status was given by god and everything had a place in society, this was the universal consensus through this period, which helped the rich stay rich and the poor stay poor. This hierarchal system was gendered, men would be at the top and women would be at the bottom. However, females and males have different experiences of poverty. There are two types of poverty that could be experienced throughout ones life: Relative poverty, whereby each household income is compared to median income and absolute poverty, where the level of poverty doesn’t change in relation to living standards, it stays the same despite the economy growing. But what kept the poor in poverty were age, disability and hierarchy, all equally important, but gender was most significant. Even with class status being a notable factor to the experiences of poverty, it linked in with gender, as women in early modern England despite class had the same roles to fulfil, which was to take up the role of a wife and mother. So, if a woman had experienced a loss of her partner, she would end up most likely in poverty, unless she is a middle-call woman, as they