The San Francisco call., 1908-03-09

were something more than $1,000, 900
greater than half of the whole coast
losses in the aggregate. In the same
period California paid out in pre-
miums s70.394.355. Now. with many
less buildings and the business portion
of its leading city much more scat
tered. the state has been compelled in
two years TO pay the sum of $4,000, 900
or go uninsured.
There still is another point of inter
est in the comparison of the amounts
California has given to insurance COM
panies In premiums In two years with
the totals for the entire coast. The
showing is as follows, when summa-
rized from long tables of figures:
Paid in premiums in 1906 and 1907 BY the
coast sas S6S S. o9a; paid in same period by Cali
fornia, $500 .000 paid in same period by San
Francisco alone S11 101s1I5.
In other words and figures Califor-
mia has paid 62 per cent of the total
of coast premiums for two years, and
San Francisco has paid "a per cent of
the whole, in round figures. Stricken
by fire, with its industries crippled
and deranged for months. San Fran
ciso has thus had burden of great
size and severity to bear The general
showing gives color to the complaint
made by the mercantile community
that the underwriters are looking to
this city to pay ultimately all the fire
losses of 1906. Applied to a single in
dividual who might be so unfortunate
as to be burned out. a proposition
would be considered absurd to make
him pay in future premiums all that
the company had paid him in insur-
ance money.
LAST TWO YEARS
The business written by the fire in
surance companies in California in the
years 1906 and 1907 amounted to
$1.3S6.174.s22 as summed up from the
returns. The total business written in
this state in-the 10 years immediately
preceding was $4.765.435.743 That OF
the two years, then. was, roughly fig
ured, about a fourth as much as that OF
the 10 years including 1896 and 1905
Butthe premiums of the last two years
1906 and 1901, were, in total. as has been
shown, $4,000, 900, as compared with
$70,294,355 paid by the state in 10
years before 1905. The dispropor-
tion is further accentuated by the loss
ratio for 1907 in this state as COM
pared with earlier ratios, which car
liability of the plea made by the un-
derwriters that their charges are made
necessary by the increased risk
The Pacific Underwater. a journal
which is considered an authority by
fire insurance men on the coast. shows
that the ratio on loss actually incurred
in 1907 was but 20.9, which is by far
the lowest ever recorded on the Pacific
coast. The companies figure out that
the loss ratio was 36.7. Some eXplana-
tion clears up how they arrive at that
conclusion. The losses incurred in 1907
amounted to about S2.000.0 900 less than
those payments for loss actually made
during the year 1907. This shows pay
ments due of 100000 carried over
from the preceding year, that, added
with the actual loss, makes the show
ing for 1907 less favorable to the state
and more favorable to the companies
as a matter of book keeping, than the
facts warrant. when the lack of justifi-
cation for the size of the imposed cinch
in premiums is taken into considera-
ton.
BUSINESSMEN FEEL BURDEN
These figures and facts are presented
that all parties in interest shall have q