What did a medieval alewife earn?
About 10 pennies clear from each brew, every two weeks.
About $260 a month in today's gold.
A month of that pay weighs about as much as 2 paperclips in gold.
Brew on Monday, sell by Friday, and pray the ale-taster is thirsty. Women's work, but part-time.
Where the money came from
Before the Black Death, women brewed most of the ale drunk in England, usually from malted barley or oats. Ale was almost the only drink of the peasants, because water was thought unhealthy. Brewing took days: the grain was soaked and left to sprout into malt, then dried, ground and steeped in hot water. Ale went sour within days, so brewing never stopped for long. The law tied the price of ale to the price of grain. At the grain prices it set out, with a quarter of barley, 8 bushels, at 20 or 24 pence, brewers in the cities could sell two gallons for a penny, and those outside them three. Each manor chose ale-tasters every year, sworn to check that ale was good and sold at the lawful price. In Brigstock the trade was led by thirty-eight brewers, all women. Only a few dozen ale fines fell on men, and each of those men was married to a woman already in the trade. Emma Kempstere of Brigstock was one of the rare women who made brewing a lasting trade with no husband named in the records. Women without husbands brewed less often and earned less, while married brewsters earned more than unmarried ones and more than married women in other trades. After 1350 men slowly took the trade over.
Sources: en.wikipedia.org · daily.jstor.org · en.wikipedia.org 2 · ora.ox.ac.uk · books.google.com
What an alewife's pay bought in 1350
a dozen eggs: less than a day's pay
a hen: 6 days' pay
a plough: 4 weeks' pay
a year's food for one adult: 22 months' pay, more than a whole year of it
a one-bay cottage: 22 months' pay, more than a whole year of it
Every price of 1350, with its source, is on the prices page.