The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1918-08-24
WORKINGNIEN's COMPENSATION.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS COMPENSATION.
The liability insurance companies
Of Minnesota have perfected an ex-
ceedingly strong organization of in
surance men for the purpose of head
! ing off state insurance in this state.
The liability companies are using
camouflage in their methods and
are enlisting the support of all sorts
of insurance men, including life, fire
and ordinary accident insurance
agents, to help them save their ba-
con.
| The advocates Of state administra-
ton of workingmen's compensation
have no desire to go into any other
line of insurance. Fire, life and or
binary accident insurance are not in
volved in employers liability, neither
do we contemplate entering move
ment for state insurance along any
of such lines.
We do, however, insist that the
state take over the administration of
the workingmen's compensation law,
and we do it for two specific reasons.
First, every element of profit
should be eliminated from the oper-
alton of the law. No person or cor
poration having a profit interest in
the adjustment of claims will give
an injured workingman or the de-
pendents of deceased workingman
the square deal that the state will
give.
Second, the state can administer
workingmen's compensation consid-
erably cheaper than private corpora
tions can do. In New York the cost
of administering workingmen's COM
pensation under state fund is only
one-fifth as much as the management
expenses charged by private insur-
ance companies. The ration of man
agement expenses tt. earned premi-
ums was less than 8 per cent in 1917.
The average expense ratio for mu-
tual companies was 20 per cent, and
for private stock companies it ran
from Al. to 62 per cent. The state
now carries about one-fifth of the
volume of workingmen's compensa-
ton insurance in New York exclusive
of the so-called self-insured en-
ployers.
These figures, compiled by Man
ager F. Spencer Baldwin of the New
York state insurance fund, speak for
themselves. Every saving in the
cost of management will permit the
state to- increase the compensation
to injured workingmen and the de-
pendents of deceased workingmen,
without additionally burdening the
industries with higher premium
rates.
No law on the statute books of
any state needs improvement so much
as the Minnesota working-men's
compensation act. The compensation
provided under this law is a dis
grace to the state. 1t fails almost
entirely to compensate 1t offers
the injured pittance and his de-
pendents an insult 1t has developed
to be but mere employers security
act to prevent workingmen from re-
ceiving deserving justice through the
mercy of courts and the pity of
juries.
The principle of workingmen's
compensation is as sound today as it
ever was. Its intention is to make
industry to bear the financial burden
of it's accidents to employees. En-
ployers are bearing the burden now
but so long as private insurance COM
panies are permitted to thrive under
the act the victims of industrial &C.
cidents will be robbed of their just
compensation. Every dollar ex.
pended in the management of a pri-
vate insurance concern takes just
that much from the laborer's COM
pensation. This is matter in which
employers should join with employees.
The efficiency of the state to handle
this matter was never higher than
!. during these war times. State ad.
ministration should materially in
crease the amount of compensation
to workingmen without adding tc
t I the present cost to employers.
| The spirit of cooperation between
employers and employees, promoted
by the war, should apply to the ad
| justment of this vexing question.
! Sound every candidate for the leg.
t islature on this issue which is made
by organized labor in Minnesota
| Vote for no man who does not pledge
himself 10 support the measure when
l it shall have been presented to the
, legislature. Remember Pittinger o.
, the Fifty-eighth district in Duluth, q
i ~