The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1909-12-28
INSURANCE INCREASES
MUTUALs ARE BEGINNING TO
ADOPT THE FRATERNAL
PLAN OF PROFITS.

New York, Dec,S 2S.-What will the
1909 totals of insurance be? This
question. which u keeping heads of
old line companies in the east on the
tenterhooks right now, is their ver-
sion Of the what shall the harvest
be" brought up tosdate by Wall street
standards. 1t has in it the makings
of a more widespread interest but
not everybody knows it. The insur-
ance totals of 1909 will guage pros
perity but also guage the public's
memory concerning partial disclosure
es regarding its own exploitation as
risks" en- masse.
Whether the expected jump in rev.
enues of the old line life and casu-
atty companies has taken place DER
schedule in spite Of certain changing
conditions in the Insurance field will
soon be known. Last year January
reports showed totals which indicated
subsiding indignation and returning
prosperity-both Of which meant big
dividends for 1909. There was then
in force life insurance in New York
state alone that totaled $1,653,311, 1894,
in Illinois $S13,954,12O, in Kansas
$129,6S2.691 and in South Dakota $780,
25S,S7S exclusive OF fraternal insur-
ance. In the casualty" field, which
nowadays covered two score new and
ingenious underwriting plans, the last
January l reports showed some stu
pendous figures, for the premiums
alone in Massachusetts, were over So
100000, in Illinois $3.50, 800 and New
York $17,232,310 OF which the losses
required on an average about thirty
eight per cent. The forty-nine cas-
ualty" companies even in 1908 made
a gain, their surplus earned above
dividends being $l6,234,972. And the
dividends were something ornament
al. as nearly everybody contributed
somewhere down Che list of under
writing novelties.
The size of the increase of revenues
and profits is what the captains of the
regular" casualty concerns are
awaiting, not doubling there was an
increase as in every year it was be-
gun. Also they are bothered by an
experiment in cooperative insurance
in Chicago which has made revela-
tions regarding the profits made in
their field. The older fraternal and
mutual forms they had competed
with and still ,proApered, by charging
high rates. but the Chicago project
has let everybody into the game of
exploiting j themselves and their
friends and bids fair to succeed be-
cause the big profits are in the in
vestments of large sums and not in
the underwriting. Cutting the un-
derwriting rates to cost by mutuals
has not pleased the insurance cap
tain. but giving the public a share of
the investment profits "js different"
and far more serious to them, the
public benefitting.
The life insurance totals increase
in 1908 over 1907 quite sharply es-
pecially in the agricultural states
like South Dakota and Kansas where
good crops have been the rule during
recent years. In South Dakota the
insurance in force jumped from $685.
9O4,949 to over sS6,OO0,OOO and in
Kansas the gain was q larger per-
centage of gain than was achieved in
eastern states, although the gain in
New York was about $65,OOO.000 and
in Massachusetts about $42,00O,OOO.
This rule held true in Minnesota also,
the gain being from $751;, ,597 $50 i'll
1907 to $196,612,6s2 in 1908. Illinois
increased it's insurance in force near
ly $25,000,000.