Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1908-11-07

To the Life Insurance Policyholder of
You are taxing your income every
year a sum of hard-earned money, paid
Tor life insurance. TO prevent your de-
pendent ones from becoming, at your
death, public charge. Your generosi-
ty, as a husband and father. and your
pride as a citizen, move you to pro-
vide a fund intended to be sacred to the
end of saving your family from be-
coming charges upon the state.
Shall the state arbitrarily assail that
fund?
To illustrate: A poor man. suddenly
taken away by accident or illness,
leaves a helpless family without insur-
ance or other property. In an outburst
of sympathy the neighbors take up q
collection to provide for the destitute
ones The state steps in and takes an
arbitrarily determined part of every
donation before it allows the total sum.
to be given to the widow and orphans
The neighbors tax themselves to relieve
the bereft, and the state taxes the tax.
This. in effect. is life Insurance
a tax upon insurance funds Is a tax
upon a tax.
The insurance companies do not own
the money paid to them; they owe
every dollar of IL to him and TO the
other policyholders who paid it. They
simply hold the money in trust and
must account for and eventually pay it
all back 1t Is not, therefore, an as
set of the companies. it is a liability.
a tax upon insurance funds is a tax
upon a debt
The premium charged by the compa-
MES is exactly sufficient. but is only
sufficient to cover the hazard and to
justify the benefits bestowed by the
policy which the money buys, so that
all taxes assessed against this money
must be paid from surplus earnings of
the companies. These surplus earnings
are equltably divided, and paid back
to policyholders who use them or
should be allowed to use them to re-
duce the cost or to increase the amount
of their insurance.
In the year 1906. AZ life companies re-
porting to the Insurance department of
the state Of New York, though doing
business in nearly all the other states,
returned to policyholders in dividends
the sum OF $39, 726, 272.0l, but were COM
PEELED to pay into the treasures of the
governments and states in which they
were doing business, in taxes Sl0,l49,
Sl6.S3, or 26.22 per cent of the amount
OF dividends returned.
If these taxes had not been added
to the expenses of the business and
We're therefore made available for that
purpose. at the average age and aver
age premium. the members of the COM
panies could have purchased for them
selves or their bencfciaries. more than
1914 900, 100000 of additional insurance.
The tax on life insurance premiums
comes straight home to the individual
through the company, and he
pays it out of his own pocket. To him |
t appears simply as a. tax on a corpo- !
alton. and not upon himself, because |
{ is indirect, the company being merely |
he channel of distribution. But he |
Hone pays it and remains in ignorance |
If the fact that the state has added
ust so much more to the price of his
PERSONAL or family protection.
1t is urged that. $ the state should
supervise tho business of insurance
lone in the state, to protect the inter-
sts of the policyholdcr. to bar insolv-
mt or unsafe or predatory companies,
he policyholder should bear the cost OF
UGH supervision. Admitting this to be
rue, should not the tax be limited to
he cost of such supervision. economic
lily oXerciScdp
In Utah, last year. the cost of super
ision was about $1,000, while the tax
imposed and collected was more than
40, 900.
tate insurance commissioners. promi-
ent, earnest men everywhere oppose
his tax upon calamity" where "hu-
nan misfortune and sorrow arc made
D pay tribute to the state treasury
In England. taxes are RENTED on
Their heads Of taxation in proportion
) the amount of life insurance pre-
lium which man pays. In Utah, in
edition 10 his other taxes he pays 2la
rntS every dollar IF bis life
lium.
Every man who pays this tax should
&c to 1t that tho truth be brought
ONE TO his legislative representatives
nd that he impress the responsibility
'r action this winter to the end that
lis wrong be speedily rghted
The l't>h s.Wc -tian Of Life Under
riters.
VIII G. I, nRra1.. 80.
II A