VII. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

Four general conclusions may be reached from the study of the foregoing tables.

1. As the general expenditure increases, the average size of the family is larger.

2. As the general expenditure increases, the average amount spent for food and for rent increases but the per cent shows a regular and definite tendency to decrease.

3. As the general expenditure increases, both the average amount and the per cent spent for clothing and miscellaneous items show a regular and a definite tendency to increase.

4. As the general expenditure increases, the average amount spent for light and fuel increases perceptibly but the per cent shows only a slight tendency in the same direction.

The above conclusions vary from those reached by Engel in the same manner that the American investigations have varied. They hold for food and luxuries (miscellaneous) but not for the rest. As in America the per cent spent for clothing increases and the per cent spent for rent decreases. In China, however, the per cent spent on light and fuel shows a slight tendency to increase while in America it decreases. This is explained by the fact already mentioned that many families in the survey gather from the fields half the fuel they consume, and some of them, most of it. This accounts for the rapid increase in the average expenditure for light and fuel as the family income becomes large enough to relieve the family of this burden.

VIII. COMPARISON WITH OTHER INVESTIGATIONS

Figure I is a comparison of our investigation with four other investigations of the subject. The purpose of the

FIGURE I

A COMPARISON OF THE EXTREMES OF VARIATION IN THE PERCENTAGE OF EXPENDITURE FOR VARIOUS PURPOSES BETWEEN THE HIGHEST AND THE LOWEST INCOME GROUPS IN FIVE INVESTIGATIONS 1

United States Bureau of Labor. 33 States. 1901. 25440 families.

Tsing Hua Investigation. Peking, China, 1918. 195 families.

(a) Chinese dollars. Exchange value fluctuates greatly but is normally about $.50.

comparison is to show the range of variation within and between them. In each case the lowest and the highest income groups are contrasted. The three American studies do not vary greatly. In general, the three belong to the same class and show the same general characteristics. Engel's study varies mainly in that a larger per cent is spent for food and a smaller per cent remains for miscellaneous expenditures. A similar study made in Massachusetts in 1885 shows the same characteristic, with 64 per cent spent for food in the lowest income group. If it were possible to push this investigation far enough back we should find the per cent spent on necessities constantly increasing and the per cent left as a margin for luxuries constantly decreasing.

Now compare the Tsing Hua results with those obtaining above. In every case the best record obtained for China is poorer than the poorest recorded in the other four, even Engel's study made in Prussia more than fifty years ago and the one made here in 1885. The per cent spent on food alone is almost as much as the entire per cent spent on all existence wants in the American cases. The maximum per cent remaining for miscellaneous expenditures in China is 6.6 per cent while, in America the lowest is nearly twice that amount. Many of the families in our investigation reported that the mere buying of the most pressing necessities of life thrust them into debt.

The comparison in this figure shows vividly what is meant by a minimum plane of existence.

IX. HOW IT IS DONE

In America a family which spends half its income on food and has less than one-fifth of it left for miscellaneous expenditures is thought to be in a very bad way,

but this is better than the best that our present study can show. In the investigation we have individual cases where as high as 90 per cent is spent for food and a larger number in which tea and meat, if they could be afforded at all, would come under the head of luxuries. How does a family of 2.5 feed itself on even 83 per cent of an income of $40 per year. The answer is that two meals of corn bread and salted turnips per day with plenty of good hot water to help it down would cost very little in America and costs much less than half as much in China. I must add, however, that, low as the standard is, I have never seen any evidence of the eating of dog flesh, rats, or any food of that sort.

The same family spends the sum of thirty cents per year on clothing. Of course this is fictitious accuracy but it shows very well the condition to which they are reduced. The acquisition of clothing is purely a matter of happy accident. In summer their clothing, tho dirty, is comfortable for it is well ventilated. In winter they suffer. Cotton is worn, single in summer and thickly padded in winter. Plenty of it is comfortably warm but people of the lowest groups have but a single suit, the cotton wadding being taken out when it is warm and replaced when the cold weather comes on.

If it takes $6 to keep a family from freezing to death in this cold North China climate, and if half the families spend less, where does fuel come from? This is answered any day during the fall and winter by the swarms of old women and children who infest the fields and highway picking up sticks, throwing clubs into the branches to break off twigs, gathering stubble from the fields, and even collecting the dry grass and leaves with a bamboo rake and basket. We have a saying in China that the whole country is raked with a fine toothed comb each year.