1980 was a difficult time to find work in much of the world. Oil prices had shot up in the 1970s, triggering inflation in oil-importing countries like Spain. This raised prices for consumers, and costs for employers. Governments imposed higher interest rates and austerity policies like wage freezes, which led to higher unemployment for people without a foothold in the formal labour market, especially young people from rural areas.
Official statistics didn’t tell the whole story, because many Spaniards worked in the informal sector, ‘off the cards’, invisible in official statistics. This was especially true for pueblos like Lagartera, where there were a lot of family businesses, many people survived on casual labor, and pluriempleo, or having more than one occupation, was common.
The rural exodus, or mass migration from the countryside to the cities, had begun in Spain in the 1950s, and intensified in the 1960s and early 1970s. It became harder to feed a family from traditional extensive farming. Buying a tractor was expensive for someone with less than 20 hectares. Higher costs and lower prices pushed smaller farmers out of production. Fewer people were employed in cereal growing and extensive livestock farming, while opportunities opened up in the cities.
Lagartera’s population peaked in the late 1960s, and then began to decline. However, this decline happened later than in surrounding pueblos, because the embroidery industry offered another way of earning a living in the pueblo. In the 1950s, some extensive farmers had moved into the embroidery business, in the 1970s, others moved into intensive pig farming, while capital was also moved from embroideries into pig farming.
By 1980, the three key sectors in the Lagarteran economy of 1980 were embroideries, livestock farming and construction work. According to the Padrón, a list of inhabitants, occupations and ages, more men were employed as agrarian day labourers than in construction. When I queried this, a helpful Lagarteran official explained that social security payments for agrarian workers were lower than for construction workers. Since pluriempleo was common, men with a foot in both sectors chose the cheapest option as their ‘official job’. This meant that there were certainly more men in construction than appear in official statistics, and that building was probably the most important activity for Lagarteran men.
Some construction workers had more job security than others, for example, sons who worked for their fathers. Non-family would be the first to be laid off when work became scarce. Some employers of non-family workers were reluctant to pay high social security and redundancy costs, especially during a recession which tends to hit construction hard. Those in the strongest position had skills, capital and contacts, while at the bottom end of the scale there were casual workers with short term jobs punctuated by periods with no work.
In 1980, most residential building consisted of house renovations, such as adding an upper story or a bathroom. Speculative building of large estates happened later, and was more characteristic of boom times in Spain. Renovations meant demand for plumbers and carpenters.
Lagarterans funded some renovations from money they had saved as migrants, either permanent, keeping on their house in the pueblo, or seasonal, from work in tourist resorts, mostly in Catalonia. In 1980, however, the resorts had been hit by the global recession, so few Lagarterans migrated there.
There was also demand for builders and allied trades from the rise of intensive pig rearing from the 1970s. Some capital for pig farms came from embroidery entrepreneurs. Big landowners could sell land to fund their piggeries. As the unemployment situation worsened, some men who had lost jobs scrimped whatever money they could to set up small piggeries.
Both residential renovations and pig farming boosted demand for blacksmiths
New piggeries were basic buildings of concrete blocks and steel girders with a light roof.
Building was seen as a traditionally male occupation, needing strength, and families were especially concerned about creating jobs for sons. Women could contribute to the family economy by running the household, doing the accounts, or sell or produce embroideries.
But these were family businesses, and sometimes the sons weren’t old enough to start to work. In this case, their big sister, Claudina, tackled a traditional ‘male’ job. Claudina’s father ran a construction materials company. She had the strength to take on the delivery work.
While construction was predominantly a male occupation, embroideries were predominantly female. Official statistics for this sector are even more misleading than for construction. Most of the embroiderers carried out piecework in their own homes, and were officially ‘housewives’.
By 1980, demand for embroideries had dropped, especially in the less expensive end of the market, and earnings had not kept up with inflation. Some families used funds from embroideries to diversify into pig farming, which seemed to offer better prospects for sons. Despite the decline this sector probably provided more employment than any other in 1980, if you count the ‘invisible women’. A low income is better than no income.
Men could run an embroidery business, putting out work and dealing with clients. Embroidery businesses also created work for commercial laundries that could wash and iron the finished products, to be ready for sale. The laundries offered some of the few ‘proper jobs’ for men in Lagartera. Again, these were family businesses, and the stress was on creating work for sons. Boys did not have skills to embroider, and the embroiderers did not earn enough to raise a family, but boys could learn to iron.
Ironing by hand was a ‘skilled job’, only for the experts. Skill was important for delicate embroideries produced for the luxury market.
Embroidered tablecloths designed for the mass market could be ironed by machine, which took less skill, though you still had to be patient and careful.
Using a washing machine can be kind of boring!
The public sector did provide some steady employment for example as council officials and teachers.
Here, Felix the municipal policeman, holds court among the retired men in the main square. He was nicknamed ‘El Turleque’ because he came from the town of Turleque, Toledo, though he married locally. The square was a meeting place for retired men to sit and chat. Women didn’t seem to retire, just carried on embroidering in the company of their neighbours.
Other formal jobs were offered by outsiders, such as banks. The priest employed a housekeeper. The nuns’ school offered some employment for teaching assistants and teachers.
There were more formal public sector jobs in nearby Oropesa, which was an administrative centre for the local area. Lagartera had few employers from outside the pueblo, so was more reliant on its own entrepreneurs. Some were self-employed by necessity, creating their own jobs. Other Lagarteran entrepreneurs had more choice, and had the funds to set up larger, more profitable enterprises.
There were huertos, vegetable gardens with a well, usually with shelter from high walls. They could be very productive in the hands of skilled gardeners, by 1980, growing vegetables had become something you did for love rather than money. It was much easier to grow vegetables commercially in parts of Spain with a more suitable climate.
In 1980, olive groves were better maintained, and their harvests were more valued than today. There were more family members in the pueblo who could help with the harvest, it was easy to take the olives to the mill in Lagartera, rather than travel a long distance as we do today. Incomes were lower, so being self-sufficient in olive oil was more important than today for family economies.
The construction sector was probably the most important activity in terms of male occupations in 1980. That reflected the resilience of the economy of Lagartera as a whole, and the contributions of the embroidery and livestock sectors.
Alison Lever, Lagartera, Toledo, March 2026