Saving the best for last? : Old age retirement among the Urban middle classes in Leiden and Regensburg (c. 1650- c. 1800)
In pre-industrial Europe, many thousands of ‘middle-class’ individuals retired by purchasing a corrody: a contract allowing them life-long food and lodging, usually by spending their remaining years in a hospital. Given that people usually struggle to prepare for the later stages of life, this article asks whether corrodies were priced in line with the market. We study institutions that specialize
