PERSONAL BUDGETS OF UNMARRIED PERSONS.

ONE subject to which the economic man gives considerable

attention is how he shall spend his income. The dictum

of science is that the last dollar expended in each case is so disbursed that the maximum of enjoyment is thereby obtained. The income of the poor man is so limited that, after he has satisfied the demands of his appetite and supported those who are dependent upon him, there is little left for what we commonly call pleasure. Dr. Engel laid down the law that the greater the income, the smaller is the relative outlay for subsistence; that the disbursement for rent varies directly with the total expenditure; that the outlay for sundries increases more rapidly than the total expenditure. There is no longer any doubt about the truth of these statements, and since they have been satisfactorily proved it seems that the curiosity of the economist along this line has been satisfied. Now and then some government appoints a committee to see that the law still holds good, and to find out what percentage of the total expenditure goes to food and what to clothing, among the working men of that country. Light, fuel and house-rent are never omitted, but as the income increases there is an ever-growing catch-all in the form of the sundries account. One intention of this paper is to further divide these accounts, and see if it is not possible to get behind the sundries curtain to find what is there concealed. Again, in the government reports it is apparently taken for granted that the whole world is composed of married persons and little children dependent upon them, leaving out of account altogether the continuously increasing numbers of the unmarried who are either supporting themselves or preparing to do so. There is no need of entering the field which is already so well supplied with the results of research, but it seems that there is now a demand for a systematic study of the accounts of the unmarried persons in our society. It is this class alone with which this paper deals.

It is the expenditure with which we are alone interested, and no attention is given to the sources of the income. It makes no

difference whether this is the reward for labor in the form of wages or salary, whether from invested capital, or money advanced by a relative to enable the recipient to complete an education. We shall, therefore, group the accounts without regard to the manner in which the money is obtained, provided only that the amount of the expenditure approaches a certain mean.1 Money invested is not to be found under the head of expenditure. Only such disbursements as brought some immediate satisfaction are included. It was thought best to exclude all payments for life insurance, since the money is invested to all intents and purposes as much as if it had been placed to an account in a savings bank. Both are cases of deferred enjoyment.

Having decided upon what constituted expenditure, there remained the problem of classification. The former plans were discarded, for it was the intention to do away with the great sundries account, and to substitute specific items. The following list was finally adopted as the best for the purpose:

It is noticeable that the items fuel, lighting, taxation and insurance, that are commonly in evidence in lists of this nature, are

'It may be objected that the accounts of the man whose income is derived from dividends or interest should not be compared to those of the wage-earner, since the former is certain to be more extravagant, but in the first place this is avoided by grouping them according to the amount expended, and again I have found it to be the case, that, as a rule, the man with the inherited income looks upon this as a trust to be carefully managed by him, while the young man with a salary of $1,000.00 feels that he is obliged to spend the greater part of this, to prove that he has such an income. The amount of saving done by the man with the moderate salary in the cities of the East at the present day is surprisingly small.

entirely absent, since they are all included under room-rent. Since these lists deal almost entirely with the accounts of single people, the desirability of the change is apparent. The most radical departure is in the attempt to resolve the pleasure account into its various elements. In the case of the family whose outlay must be brought under $12.00 a week to make ends meet, it may not be desirable to distinguish the expenditure for social functions from that for golf, but with the unmarried man who spends a considerable portion of his income along these lines the distinction is important.

The finest field for the study of such questions to be found in this country is in the American college or university, where thousands of young men and women are gathered together, and whose accounts would furnish ample material.1 It seems remarkable that this opportunity should have been so long neglected. I have been for several years collecting the accounts of the students in the two upper classes in Yale College, from which the following results are obtained:

Plate I: average yearly expenditure of Yale student of two upper classes.

It must not be understood from the above figures that the average student in the two upper classes at Yale spends $1,116.00 yearly, but this happens to be the average of about five hundred 1 The number of budgets consulted in gathering the figures used in this article is nearly 3,000, nearly all of which date from 1897 to 1901.

In the accounts of the students the item of tuition has been added and, since all of the accounts did not include charity, this has been omitted from all and been put with sundries under pleasure.

accounts which I have been able to gather. It was obtained by
the method of simple average, and consequently too great import-
ance may be given to the expenditures of the more extravagant
students. In all of the expenditures the figures desired are not so
much absolute numbers as the percentages which follow:

It is, however, of interest to see whether the law of Engel holds
true with regard to the expenditures of students, and if those
getting a large allowance spend a greater percentage of it on
pleasure than do their poorer classmates. This can be clearly
shown by dividing the accounts into three classes varying with
the amount of expenditure.

When we study these three sets of figures in their relations to one another, some points stand out very clearly. The theory of Engel is verified without a doubt. The amounts spent by the three classes for necessities vary roughly in the progression 1, 2, 3; for stationery 1, 12, 2; for pleasure 1, 3, 6; and for tobacco and intoxicants 1, 2, 14. It is evident that the surplus of the wealthier man does not go to the provision of his library, but is spent in diversion more or less harmful.1

It is interesting to note the order of magnitude of the different items in these lists:

It is noticeable that the same five items are found at the head of each of the lists with simply the order changed in most cases. Clothing advances from fourth place to first, showing that this does not agree with the statement of Engel when applied to the accounts of unmarried people. Traveling, on the contrary, preserves the same position throughout, making it clear that some of this expenditure might better go under the pleasure account, or that the wealthy students come from a greater distance. Books are found to occupy the same place in the first two lists, but in the last this item is wanting altogether, and in its place is tobacco and intoxicants. This needs no comment, and in fact a very good picture of the daily life of these students could be gained from a study of these accounts.

Another point worthy of notice is that, whereas the total expenditure in the cases in question increases 1, 2, 3, that on clothing grows 1, 3, 5, showing that the element of vanity entering here turns this to a condition more nearly resembling the amount

'Nine out of every ten of those spending over $1,000 put less money in books than the average of those spending $700 to $1,000, but the presence of a few book collectors among the wealthiest students brings up the average.