To know "an average workman's weekly wages" demands access to statistics that are easily available in a country were almost all wages are taxed and noted in computerised records, but no so easily available in a country were that is not the case.

By the way, they probably could not foresee inflation in the way it exists today. Why would you have permanent inflation unless you print a lot of papermoney to cover the costs of a war? Which they had just done, making everybody convinced that metalmoney was the way of the future.

Coincidentally, the swedish voting law from 1866 contained economical barriers towards voting for the parliament. Fortunately they put them in exact numbers. Inflation meant more and more voters until liberals and socialists could win on a universal and equal suffrage platform.

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