Humphries gained her economics degree from Newnham College, Cambridge, in 1970; she went on to Cornell University to do both her masters and then her doctorate which she completed in 1973.
Career
Her professional life began at University of Massachusetts Amherst, first as an assistant professor (1973–1979), then as an associate professor (1979–1980). She was lecturer at the University of Cambridge and later a fellow of Newnham College (1980–1995). In 1993, during her period at Newnham College, Humphries was a visiting fellow at the Centre for Population and Development within Harvard University's School of Public Health.
Humphries, Jane (2010). Childhood and child labour in the British Industrial Revolution. Cambridge, UK New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN9780521847568.
Humphries, Jane; Floud, Roderick; Johnson, Paul (2014). Cambridge economic history of modern Britain: 1870 to the present (2nded.). Cambridge New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN9781107686731.
Chapters in books
Humphries, Jane; McNay, Kirsty (2009), "Death and gender in Victorian England", in Kanbur, Ravi; Basu, Kaushik (eds.), Arguments for a better world: essays in honor of Amartya Sen | Volume II: Society, institutions and development, Oxford New York: Oxford University Press, pp.259–279, ISBN9780199239979.
Humphries, Jane; Rubery, Jill (December 1984). "The reconstruction of the supply side of the labour market: the relative autonomy of social reproduction". Cambridge Journal of Economics. 8 (4): 331–346. doi:10.1093/oxfordjournals.cje.a035554.
Humphries, Jane (July 2001). "Child labor: lessons from the historical experience of today's industrial economies". The World Bank Economic Review. 17 (2): 175–196. doi:10.1093/wber/lhg016. hdl:10986/17178. S2CID16712334.