Wages through the Ages — data & sources
This page exists so you can check our working. Every figure in Wages through the Ages traces to one of the sources below, each listed with its catalogue number, the table or series we used, and exactly what we took from it. Where no source met our bar, the article shows a dash instead of a number — those gaps are listed here too, with the retrieval paths we've already tried. Reviewed 30 July 2026.
Method — the whole model in four lines
Items: minutes = price ÷ hourly wage × 60, where hourly = weekly ÷ 40 before 1983 and ÷ 38 after (standard week: 40 hours from 1 January 1948, 38 hours from the 1983 decisions).
Houses: years = median price ÷ (weekly wage × 52).
Pre-decimal money: converted at the official changeover rate, £1 = $2 (14 February 1966). An imperial quart of milk = 1.136 litres; per-litre figures are our normalisation.
Timing: price quarters are matched to the nearest wage anchor (financial-year wages for the RBA series, November quarters for AWOTE). Each pairing is shown in the article's "show the working" rows.
The two labelled derived cells (today's bread and milk) are computed as: June 2011 ABS Sydney price × Sydney All-groups CPI growth from the June 2011 quarter (index 99.2) to the September 2025 quarter (index 143.9). Worked: bread $3.51 × (143.9 ÷ 99.2) = $5.09; milk 2 L $3.06 × 1.451 = $4.44. These are estimates, not measurements, and are marked as such wherever they appear. They stand until we replace them with dated shelf-price captures.
Wages
SOURCE 1
RBA Occasional Paper 8 — Australian Economic Statistics 1949–50 to 1996–97
Tables 4.17 (average weekly earnings per employed male unit) and 4.18 (AWOTE, full-time adults)
What we took: weekly wage anchors $18.28 (FY 1949–50), $29.15 (1952), $32.25 (FY 1954–55), $41.23 (FY 1959–60), $44.48 (FY 1961–62), $51.73 (FY 1964–65), $78.98 (FY 1970–71), $94.85 (FY 1972–73), $210.28 (FY 1978–79) from Table 4.17; $346.00 (Nov 1983) and $555.60 (Nov 1990) from Table 4.18. Calibration rows verified in the primary file (1949–50 = $18.275; 1970–71 = $78.975).
SOURCE 2
ABS 6302.0 — Average Weekly Earnings, Australia, November 2025
Table 3, AWOTE full-time adult persons, original series A85002148L (released 26 February 2026)
What we took: $661.20 (Nov 1995), $1,011.80 (Nov 2005), $1,330.10 (Nov 2011), $1,500.50 (Nov 2015), $1,748.40 (Nov 2021), $2,051.10 (Nov 2025). The Nov 1995 observation was retrieved from the same series via the ABS Data API (dataflow AWE, key 3.1.3.7.TOT.10.AUS.S) and cross-checks the published anchors exactly. Note the 1981–83 series break against Source 1: AWE per male unit and AWOTE persons are related but not directly comparable.
House prices
SOURCE 3
Stapledon, N.D. (2007) — Long Term Housing Prices in Australia and Some Economic Perspectives, PhD thesis, UNSW
Table A.15, p.228 — Sydney nominal median, all houses, June quarter (modified median). DOI 10.26190/unsworks/17467
What we took: $4,370 (1950), $5,450 (1955), $8,720 (1960), $12,050 (1965), and the $17,280 (1970) cross-check against Source 4. The pre-1970 real-terms trend cross-checks against Stapledon's UNSW Discussion Paper 2010-18, Table 1.
SOURCE 4
Abelson & Chung (2006) — The Real Story of Housing Prices in Australia, 1970–2003
Table 1 — Sydney median house prices, NSW Valuer-General data (academic series; attributed, not official)
What we took: $18,700 (1970), $85,900 (1984), $194,000 (1990), $196,750 (1995). Methodology differs from Stapledon's — the 1970 join is shown in the article, not spliced.
SOURCE 5
ABS 6416.0 — Residential Property Price Indexes: Eight Capital Cities, December 2021 (final release)
Table 4, Sydney median price of established house transfers, series A83728545T. Series discontinued after this release.
What we took: $500,000 (Dec 2005), $915,000 (Dec 2015), $1,300,000 (Dec 2021) — the last official Sydney median the ABS published.
SOURCE 6
Cotality (formerly CoreLogic) Home Value Index — January 2026 report, data to 31 December 2025
Sydney median house value. Commercial index; attributed, not official — used only where the ABS series has ended, and labelled on every appearance.
What we took: $1,587,709 (Dec 2025). Sanity-checked against ABS Total Value of Dwellings, March quarter 2026 (NSW mean dwelling price $1,324,800; national $1,111,100) — means and medians differ, which is why we label rather than blend.
Groceries, beer and petrol
SOURCE 7
CBCS / ABS 6403.0 and 6403.0.55.001 — Average Retail Prices of Selected Items, Sydney
Issues used: Mar 1962 (64030_03_1962.pdf, released 19-07-1962) · Dec 1965 (64030_12_1965.pdf, released 11-02-1966) · Dec 1970 · Mar 1979 · Mar 1984 · Dec 1990 · Dec 2005 · Jun 2011 (final issue). 2005/2011 datacubes verified live and byte-identical on the Wayback Machine.
What we took: bread (2 lb loaf to 1970; 680 g sliced 1979–1990; 650 g in 2005; 650–750 g in 2011), milk (quart to 1970; 1 L and 2 L after), draught beer in a public bar (285 ml, 1979 onwards), petrol (super 1984–1990, ULP 2005–2011). The ABS describes these as "approximate indicators" of average prices — treat every derived minute accordingly. The 1962/1965 bulletins cover food only; they contain no beer or petrol prices.
SOURCE 8
Daily Mirror (Sydney), 31 October 1952 — via Trove, article 276508944
Government price-control notice for Sydney beer, effective 1 November 1952
What we took: middy (10 oz) 1s 1d; schooner (15 oz) 1s 4d; pint 1s 8½d. Converted at £1 = $2 for the minutes calculation.
SOURCE 9
The Canberra Times, 30 July 1973, p.1 — via Trove, article 110740105
AHA-recommended ACT public-bar prices effective that day
What we took: 7 oz glass 18c; 10 oz glass 23c; 15 oz schooner 29c (pre-rise 27c). Caveats carried in the article: ACT prices, not Sydney; FY 1972–73 wage against a July 1973 price.
SOURCE 10
ACCC petrol price monitoring — FY 2024–25
Annual average retail petrol price, five largest cities
What we took: 180.1 cents per litre. This is a five-city average, not Sydney alone — the only official petrol average currently published.
SOURCE 11
ABS Consumer Price Index — All groups, Sydney (6401.0)
Index numbers, original, via ABS Data API (dataflow CPI, key 1.10001.10.1.Q): June 2011 quarter = 99.2; September 2025 quarter = 143.9 (latest quarterly observation on this basis at retrieval, 30 July 2026)
What we took: the 143.9 ÷ 99.2 = 1.451 growth factor used only for the two labelled derived cells (today's bread and milk). No other cell uses CPI.
SOURCE 12
RBA pre-decimal inflation calculator
Reference tool, linked from the article's FAQ
What we took: nothing numerical — linked as the canonical tool for converting pre-decimal amounts into today's purchasing power.
SOURCE 13
Media-reported 2020s public-bar beer prices — news.com.au, Nine, AHA
Media reporting, not official statistics — labelled "media-reported" on every appearance in the article
What we took: a typical schooner averaging $8.00–$9.50 by 2023 (news.com.au, "$40 receipt reveals just how expensive beer has become" and "Shock graph shows how tax made Australian beer among the most expensive in the world"); $12.00–$14.20 at premium and inner-city venues (Nine, 4 March 2026, "Tap beer price rise — how Asahi/Lion increases impact prices at the pub"; news.com.au); and the AHA's recommended schooner price of $9.50 in March 2026 (via Yahoo Finance AU, 5 March 2026 — the AHA state branch is unconfirmed, and schooner sizes differ by state, so this figure supports the range rather than standing alone). Minutes computed against the November 2025 AWOTE hourly rate: $8.00 → 8.9 min, $9.50 → 10.6 min, $12.00 → 13.3 min. The ABS stopped pricing public-bar beer in June 2011 and no official successor exists; the remaining upgrade path is a dated price-board capture from a named Sydney public bar, which would replace this range with a single hard number.
The honest gaps
Cells we show as a dash, and why. If you hold a source that closes one — a dated docket, a price-control notice, a menu with a date on it — we genuinely want it: contact us.
- GAP1950s–60s bread, milk and petrol (pre-1962): the CBCS Labour Reports (6101.0) for 1950, 1955 and 1965 carry index numbers only, no prices — we verified the chapter PDFs before calling this a dead end. Remaining path: Trove price-control notices.
- GAP1960s Sydney beer: no dated price found to our bar; the nearest sourced anchor is the July 1973 ACT notice (Source 9). A Trove sweep of 1965–69 metropolitan dailies is the open retrieval path.
- EST2020s public-bar beer: not a gap any more, but not official either — the article publishes a media-reported range ($8.00–$9.50 typical schooner by 2023; premium venues higher; see Source 13), labelled "media-reported, not official statistics" on every appearance. The ABS series ended in June 2011 and no official successor exists. Crowd-sourced trackers (e.g. a NSW average pint of $11.36, accessed 30 July 2026) remain indicative only. Pending upgrade: a dated price-board or menu capture from a named Sydney public bar.
- GAPPetrol before 1984: not in the 6403.0 food bulletins we hold for 1962–1979.
- EST2020s bread and milk: not gaps but estimates — CPI-derived per Source 11, labelled "derived, not measured" everywhere they appear, pending dated shelf-price captures.
Citation line for media: "AusCalcs, Wages through the Ages (auscalcs.com.au/guides/wages-through-the-ages/), computed from RBA OP8, ABS 6302.0/6403.0/6416.0, Stapledon (2007), Abelson & Chung (2006), ACCC and Cotality data." A link back is appreciated and helps others check the working too.
Disclaimer: This page is general information only and is not financial advice. Historical figures come from the sources listed and carry the caveats noted; derived figures are estimates and are labelled as such. AusCalcs is not affiliated with the Australian Government, the ABS or the RBA.