TOTAL AND PER CAPITA COST OF THE WIFE'S FUNERAL BENEFIT. ================================================================ | | | Total | Annual Cost | |Member-| Expenditure | per Member Union. | Year. |ship | for Wife's | of Wife's | | | Funeral | Funeral | | | Benefit. | Benefit. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Brotherhood |1894-1896 | 29,500| $13,525.00| $ .23 of Carpenters |1896-1898 | 30,600| 6,725.00| .11 |1898-1900 | 50,000| | |1900-1902 |106,800| 29,540.00| .13 |1902-1904 |141,800| 46,892.60| .16 |1904-1906 |165,700| 45,525.00| .13 | | | | |Jan. 1-July 1,| | | Tailors | 1890-1891 | 3,760| 4,925.00| .86-2/3 |July 1-Jan. 1,| | | | 1891-1894 | 7,560| 12,150.00| .64 | 1894 | 8,200| 3,600.00| .44 | 1895 | 8,600| 2,435.00| .28 | 1896 | 9,600| 1,674.70| .17 |To July 1, | | | | 1897 | 10,500| 499.00| .10 ---------------------------------------------------------------- In both unions the per capita cost of the benefit was relatively high at the outset, chiefly on account of the larger size of the benefit, but partly on account of the laxity of the rules governing its administration. In the Carpenters the wife's funeral benefit of twenty-five dollars and fifty dollars to members in good standing for six months and one year, respectively, costs each member about fifteen cents annually. The cost of the seventy-five dollar wife's funeral benefit in the Tailors' Union ran in the first year as high as eighty-six and two thirds cents. At the time the benefit was abolished the amount paid was practically the same as that now paid by the Carpenters and the per capita cost had fallen to about seventeen cents in 1896. It may fairly be concluded that a wife's funeral benefit of twenty-five dollars will cost each member of the union about fifteen cents annually.