However, the period also saw the growth of a middle class, centred upon the growing bureaucracy associated with Bourbon rule, and upon a limited development of commerce and industry.
In Santander, an economic survey known as the Catastro of Ensenada showed that almost all the registered residents were nobles, despite being peasants or working as masons, blacksmiths and other trades (Lynch, p. 226).
The Bourbons opposed the political pretensions of the nobility, decreased its number, restricted its fiscal exemptions by indirect taxes, and decreed that work was compatible with noble status (Lynch, p. 226).
Some nobles and monasteries wielded considerable power in their locality, administering justice, levying fees, collecting taxes, and imposing feudal rights and services, from which they obtained rents and products from the land and, in general, dominated the lives of their vassals.
As hidalgos were losing influence relative to peasants, merchants and artisans, they gathered into a new social class, the bourgeoisie.
The wish for escaping from the social class which they belonged to by becoming noblemen was understandable, as agriculture was a good way of investing money and did not necessarily compel them to abandon their profession.
The increase of population, the expansion of the service sector and the general economic development contributed to improved employment opportunities for the artisans and workers in cities.
The worst living conditions for peasants were found in Andalucía, which contained the highest proportion of landless rural labourers (jornaleros).