The travelling loan in the Cigar Makers was for some time badly administered. Until the adoption of the out-of-work benefit, the financial secretaries, moved by sympathy, frequently granted the benefit to members who had never left their jurisdiction and who had no intention of leaving.[197] This practice endangered the entire system.[198] Since the adoption of the out-of-work benefit the amount of loans per capita of membership has diminished. At present the cost of the travelling benefit in the Cigar Makers is not large; the loans are promptly and efficiently collected. Data for recent years are not available; but in the period from 1881 to 1901 the sum of $735,266 was loaned and $660,255 was repaid. The balance outstanding at the close of 1900 was $75,014, and of this a considerable part was collectible. The net cost of the system for twenty-one years was thus certainly less than $50,000, an average annual cost of about $2400, or an annual average per capita cost of ten cents. Even in the Typographia, where the benefit is a gift, the annual per capita cost to the membership is not large, varying from eleven to sixty cents, according to the state of employment. [Footnote 197: Cigar Makers' Journal, Vol. 6, July, 1881, p. 1.] [Footnote 198: _Ibid.,_ Vol. 9, July, 1884, p. 3.] CHAPTER V. SUPERANNUATION BENEFITS. In 1901 thirty-eight of the one hundred principal British unions paid a superannuation benefit. These unions had a membership of 566,765, and the amount paid in superannuation benefits from 1892 to 1901 was about one sixth of the total amount expended for all benefits.[199] In the American trade unions, on the other hand, superannuation benefits are paid by only a few unions. A considerable number of unions have in recent years been considering the advisability of introducing this feature, and it is likely within a brief period to form an important part of the beneficiary system of the American unions. [Footnote 199: Weyl, "Benefit Features of British Trade Unions," in Bulletin of the Bureau of Labor, Vol. 12, p. 722.] The superannuation benefit may take several forms--a weekly stipend, a lump sum or a support in a home for the aged. The aim of the benefit in all three cases is to protect the member in old age. The weekly stipend is regarded as the preferable form, since in going to a home the member must leave his family. Ordinarily, too, a weekly payment is deemed wiser than a lump sum, since the aged member cannot very well manage property, and the chances are that he will lose his capital. The British trade unions uniformly pay the benefit in the form of a weekly or monthly pension.