Booth, Charles
Booth, Charles (1840–1916). Booth, a wealthy Liverpool shipowner and social investigator, refused to accept the findings of the Social Democratic Federation that about 25 per cent of the working population were living in poverty. He found that official statistics were substantially defective and began his own investigation using statistical techniques to come to accurate conclusions. Booth published seventeen volumes on the life and labour of London's poor between 1889 and 1903. His main finding was that the SDF estimate was too low: 30.7 per cent were living in poverty. Only 0.9 per cent were responsible for their own poverty: the main causes were inadequate wages and precarious employment. He drew a poverty line at £1.05 per week for a ‘moderate family’ and felt that the state should help the honest poor and, in particular, provide old-age pensions. Booth greatly influenced the practice of later social investigators and the Liberal government (1906–14).
John Butt
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Booth, Charles