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Speenhamland was an English system of outdoor relief intended to mitigate rural poverty during the early 19th century.
It is named after the hamlet of Speen near Newbury in Berkshire, where, in 1795, the authorities approved a means-tested sliding-scale of wage supplements in order to mitigate the worst effects of rural poverty.
Unfortunately, it tended to aggravate the underlying causes of poverty in any particular parish. The immediate impact of paying this poor rate fell on the landowners of the parish concerned. They then sought other means of dealing with the poor, such as the workhouse funded through parish unions.
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