Evening capital. (Annapolis, Md.) 1884-1910, 1888-05-02

Can Profit ne Made In Insuring Un-
healthy Lives-A Table OF Comparative
Probabilifies-Theore Expectations
of the Diseased.
The practice OF the life insurance COM
panies in insuring only the best lives has
often been the subject of grim kind OF
humor. "The people they insure" it is
said, s'are those who appear from medi-
cal examination to stand In no need of i'm
surance, while those who really do need
it cannot get it.n This is not altogether
true, of course. A good many Of the
people who can successfully pass the medi-
cal examiners of the insurance companies
stand quite as much in need of insurance
as those who cannot pass, but it is GER
tainly unfortunate that the latter, who
certainly do stand in need Of insurance,
are unable to get it. 1t is not only un-
fortunate, but seems to be trifie unjust;
and the question is often seriously asked
why, when the insurance risks are based
on general mortality and not on the NOR
tality among selected lives, the insurance
companies should decline risks upon any
lives but the selected?
The answer is, probably, that the in-
surance companies are not doing business
on philanthropic principles-though their
solicitors would fain persuade us to the
contrary-but to make money. But even
when the answer has been given the ques-
ti0n may still be asked whether there is
not a profit to be made in insuring i'm
paired lives.
THE UNHEALTHY LIFE.
An article in The American Exchange
and Review indicates the possibility that
this question may yet be answered in the
affirmative. 1t points out that while the
unhealthy life Is, as a rule, in greater
peril Of death than the healthy one, the
risk in the case of the former can, in all
probability, be determined with as much
accuracy and safety as it can in the case
of the latter. This is certainly reason
able view. The number of years upon
which healthy man of 90, or 30 or 40,
or any other age, can reasonably expect
to live, has been ascertaincd by careful
compilation Of vital statistics. What is
to prevent the ascertainment. by like
careful compilation, of the age to which
an unhealthy or unsound man of 90, 80
or 40, or any other age, may expect to
live?
To certain small extent, according to
the article referred to, this has been done
by the Institute of Actuarics in London,
1u6AAhitif III CONSTRUCTING ~ btiDlG OL COLfl-
parative probabilities in the cases Of
healthy and diseased lives The figures
though not at all conclusive, are very i'm
teresting, showing side by side the sur
yivorships at 20, 80, 40, so, GO, etc., of
10000 healthy and 10000 diseased lives,
starting at the age of 10. Singularly
enough, at the age of 20 the showing in
the case of the diseased lives is the better,
0,679 of them surviving against 1854 of
the healthy lives. From that time for
ward, however, the figures favor the
healthy lives in a gradually increasing
ratio. At 30 the survivors in the healthy
10000 are 1904 against 8, 548 I'm the dis
eased 10000. At GO the healthy side
shows 5,547 survivors and the. diseased
only ,632. At 90 they are nearly equal
but the diseased lives have the advantage
by one, showing 20 against 25 of the
healthy lives.