Southwest Washington labor press. [volume] (Hoquiam, Wash.) 19??-19??, 1925-07-31
LABOR'S COOPERATIVE
/. IDEA APPLIED TO OWN
INSURANCE PROBLEMS

WASHINGTON. D. c., July 3d.
One Of Labor's greatest undertakings
Is that Of cooperation and this Is ex-
emplified in many Of its undertakings
and enterprises. In fact. cooperation
may be said to be the fundamental
idea on which organized labor is
based. The objects for which the
workers organized have been varied,
higher wages and the better working
conditions being prominent, but the
very reason for organizing was that
TIE combined or cooperative efforts
Of the workers could overcome a sit
uatoin OF produce a result which
could never be accomplished % the iu-
dlvidual Workers alone.
So sucrcssfuI have the workers
been IN carrying out their ideas OF
combining or cooperating for the COM
mon good that there Is now tbs gr..a.-
est respect felt toward the labor
Movement and its accomplishments.
Protection Of the workers has devel-
oped 50 that now, instead of the COOP
Grafton of few employees to force
some local situation, Unions and
Brotherhoods are National and Inter-
national, and watch cerefuIIy over the
welfare Of their members in ell possi-
BILE ways, working to get protective
laws passed where needed, and deal
ing with employers as whole in
stead Of singly.
This idea Of cooperation, therefore,
is no new one for Labor, but the
cooperative feature Of legal reserve
life insurance by Labor is a new way
Of applying the same cooperative idea.
We all know what organized labor
is and what cooperation is. But what
$ insurance?
Insurance is provision made by a
group Of persons, each, singly, in
danger Of some loss, the incidence of
which cannot be foreseen, that when
such loss shall occur to any Of them
it shall be distributed over the whole
group. It's essential elements are
foresight and cooperation; the former
the special distinction Of civilized man,
the latter the means Of social pro-
gress."
The underlying feature Of life insur-
ance is of course that as each one
must die, ell viii combine and cooper
ate, by the payment Of premiums
during life or for a fixed time, so
that each viii have obtained sum Of
money, payable usually at death, out
of the combined savings from the pre-
miums.
, The element of chance is eliminated
because of the laws which have been
made very rigorous, requiring the
companies to hold for each policy
holder the '1egal-reserve" Of money
which will result in payment Of the
policy at his death or due date of the
policy. The reserves are all based on
tables made up from the actual his
tory Of many thousand lives, to find
the length Of an average life and the
amount Of money needed to pay the
insurance.
There is, as we all know, no element
Of chance in death, although no noe
knows the length Of life.
AS one prospect" said to an in
surance agent who wanted him to
take a policy: "YOu have to die to
beat it." The agent replied: "Well,
you are going to die anyway. Why
not beat It'll"
This cooperative idea of insurance
has long been effectively used by the
commercial companies, so that untold
wealth is now controlled by the insur-
ance business throughout the world.
Labor's first step has now been tax
en- into this field by the Union Coop
erative Insurance Association, Machin-
lists Building. Washington, D. c., or
ganized and controlled BY q group Of
labor, 50 that now workers can obtain
the standard forms Of life insurance
for themselves and their families, and