is wanting, and only an approximate estimate is possible on the basis of the salaries and wages earned by nearly six million persons employed in manufacturing industries, averaging almost exactly $600 a year. Reducing this amount to $360 a year on account of the lower cash earnings of farmers and agricultural laborers, I find that, estimating the number of men and women employed in gainful occupations during 1909 at 34,253,000, the total sum received in wages and salaries would be approximately $12,331,000,000, of which 2 per cent. would produce about $250,000,000 a year. Now, at age sixty-five, an old age pension scheme for the entire United States population, at the rate of only $1.50 a week, would cost about $279,000,000, whereas at $2.50 a week it would cost over $462,000,000. It would therefore require at least 2 per cent. of all wages and salary payments, producing approximately $250,000,000, on the basis of the previous estimate, while nearly 4 per cent. would be required, exclusive of administration expenses, to provide the higher rate of pension of $2.50. Since the wage tax would be derived from practically the entire productive population, it may safely be estimated that at least 75 per cent. of the entire population at ages sixty-five and over would take advantage of old age pensions if they were offered as a right under the conditions stated in view of the fact that the payments were produced by deductions from wages. Few who have argued in behalf of retirement funds and pensions in the civil service have gone further than to suggest deductions of 2 per cent. A lower age than sixty-five would involve an enormous increase in the cost, and necessitate wage deductions of at least 3 per cent., if not more, while a higher age would make the scheme more nearly feasible. Curiously enough, it has been estimated in Germany that the cost of the old age pension and invalidity system amounts to about 2 per cent. on wages, but this apparently is only the portion paid by industry, so that double the proportion would represent approximately the total cost; that is, 4 per cent. of the pay-roll would be necessary to produce the pensions which are granted to German workingmen.

Upon one point, however, there should be no mistake, and that is the unquestionable truth that old age pensions will not materially change the lot of those who are most in need of moral and material uplift,-the very poor and pauper classes. It is very doubtful if it can be said with truth that the problem of to-day is that of poverty, against the problem of pauperism at an earlier period, for, while fortunately the actual extent of pauperism in this country is not large, there is really more of it than is generally assumed. Not even in Germany has state insurance, so called, reached this most unfortunate element, and in the nature of the case it is very doubtful if it ever can. State pensions in old age granted as a right will in fact reach a totally different class than the very poor or pauper element, most in need of financial security and support. The class which would be reached manages now, somehow, to keep out of the poorhouse and the ministering hands of private or public charities by making skilful use of every expedient to maintain selfrespect and independence in old age. The poor in this respect have resources unsuspected by the well-to-do, resulting from their solidarity and independence, quite different from the prevailing ethical conceptions among the more prosperous element of the population. There are those who think little of the sacrifices of the poor, and there are those who grieve at their sorrow and suffering, but in the making of character and the development of the strength of the people the ministry of sorrow has its place for the infinite good of the race as a whole. It is one of the most discouraging signs of the time, foreboding ill for the future, that the capacity for suffering, self-sacrifice, and selfdenial, should be less common than in former years, and the most conclusive evidence of this assertion is to be found in the ever-increasing tendency toward suicide throughout the various civilized countries of the earth.

It is difficult to understand why those who are so profoundly interested in this subject of old age pensions and the more or less deplorable condition of the poor in old age do not take steps to secure by direct inquiry and careful analysis the facts which will go far to explain why three-fourths or more of the

population in old age are not in the poorhouses, not public charges, and not economically dependent in any sense whatever. By an analysis made some years ago of the proportion of paupers in Massachusetts almshouses, among the total population at ages sixty and over I found that only two in every hundred were in this unfortunate predicament, and that even at ages ninety and over the proportion was less than 5 per cent. Now, it seems to me of far greater importance than the question why there should be poverty in old age (which in fact is simple enough and really requires no extended analysis of methods or motives) to ascertain how it is that the 98 per cent. who are not in almshouses have managed to keep out of them and what their respective conditions really are.

Summarizing the foregoing remarks and conclusions, they appear to confirm the view arrived at by a strictly scientific and impartial analysis of the available facts that:-

The only state pension plan which is likely to meet with public approval must be on a non-contributory basis, corresponding to the recent English act and the more or less similar laws of New Zealand and New South Wales.

The economic or social necessity for such a radical innovation has not been established for the state of Massachusetts or for any other American state.

The term "pension," as used in connection with the agitation for systematic financial provision for the aged, is misleading in that what is guaranteed is not a pension in the true sense of the word, but poor-relief under another name.

At the present time, of the population of the United States sixty-five years of age and over, 1.6 per cent. are in almshouses, and, while of the remainder quite a proportion, no doubt, are dependent or physically infirm, they are not a very heavy burden to the tax-payers under the prevailing methods of charitable relief. In Massachusetts out of every one hundred of the population over sixty-five years of age, only 1.4 are in almshouses, and no very decided divergence from this proportion is met with in other states.

The age sixty-five is usually suggested as a minimum, and

seventy is generally conceded to be too high to result in any material improvement in the financial circumstances of the aged. The demand, however, is practically certain, in course of time, to be for a reduction of the pensionable age to sixty, which, of course, would enormously increase the cost of whatever state pension scheme might be adopted.

A serious consideration is implied in the probability that invalidity, or physical unfitness for work, at other than the pensionable age period, would be considered as of equal right entitled to systematic state support, and the tendency would be to follow the method of New South Wales, and make such invalidity or incapacity pensionable at ages sixty and over. (In Denmark the age is fifty-five.)

The ultimate cost of a state pension scheme varies with the pensionable age adopted, the pensionable amount granted, and the pensionable proportion of the population within the pensionable class. In New South Wales the proportion actually receiving pensions at ages sixty-five and over is 40 per cent., but there are strong reasons to believe that the proportion in the United States would be larger, provided the pension were granted as a right, and not as a privilege.

A minimum pension rate fairly in conformity to the American standard of life would need to be at least $2.50 a week, or about $130 a year. The Massachusetts proposals, however, have been as high as $260 a year, which, of course, would impose a decidedly greater burden upon the tax-payers of the state. In proportion as the amount payable is increased, the numbers who would take advantage of the pension grants would be increased.

As to the probable pensionable proportion of the population, it is safe to assume that the large majority of the aged, if entitled to a state pension as a right, would avail themselves of their prerogative under whatever legislation might be adopted.

In the United States at the present time the estimated population aged sixty-five and over is 3,557,000, and, if 50 per cent. of this population were to receive pensions, the annual cost

at the rate of $130 a year would be $231,190,000.* In the state of Massachusetts the population aged sixty-five and over may be conservatively estimated at 162,000, and 50 per cent. of this population, at a pensionable rate of $130 per annum, would require an annual expenditure of $10,520,000, exclusive, of course, of the cost of administration. If the pensionable age were reduced to sixty, the cost for the United States, upon the preceding assumption, would be $366,132,000, and for the state of Massachusetts $16,424,000. If the pensionable age, however, were placed at seventy, the cost for the United States. would be $133,256,000, and for Massachusetts $6,228,000, exclusive, of course, of the expenses of administration.

The administrative expenses have been estimated at 3 per cent. for the Australian Commonwealth, but they would probably in this country attain to a somewhat higher proportion, and hardly be less than 5 per cent. of the total pensionable

amounts.

The final total cost of a state pension scheme on the noncontributory plan would have to be raised by additional taxation, and the source of such taxation would probably be a substantial increase in the poll tax, or a special tax on inheritance, an income tax, or, finally, a stamp tax on wages.

A poll tax of $2 a year would be wholly inadequate to meet the minimum cost requirements, while even a poll tax of $5, as it has been suggested, would, in all probability, still be insufficient. What amounts could be produced by specific taxes on inheritances is merely conjectural. A stamp tax of 2 per cent. on wages would also probably prove insufficient, and as much as 4 per cent., if not more, might be required.

It is probable that the various disqualifications for pensions which have been suggested would gradually be done away with, and correspondingly, of course, the total amounts to be provided for by taxation would increase. A gradual increase in the longevity of the aged would also tend to enhance the financial difficulties of the proposition, so much so that a very material

* At 40 per cent. of pensionable population, the annual cost would be $184,952,000. For details, see the tables in the statistical appendix.