Evening star., 1934-10-07
SPENDING FOR A GOOD TIME
BY FREDERIC ]. HASKIN.

The American people spend nearly
one-third of their total disbursements
for amusement, entertainment, and
service In the three States Of New
York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania,
and II the figures were further broken
down it probably would be shown
that most of it is spent in New York
City. No matter how good or how
bad the times, 1t appears that the
metropolis continues to draw the ex-
ira dollars which Americans have to
spend on a good time and special
services.
The figures are being worked out
by the Domestic Commerce Division
on the basis Of statistics gathered in
the course of the census of retail dis
tribution. OF course the three States
named have more than one-fifth of
the entire population of the Nation
2l4 per cent, to be exact-but the
proportion of the national income
spent for fun in that region far out
strips the proportion of the popula-
ton resident there.
The bright lights Of a metropolis
gather people from far and wide. The
East North Central Region comes Sec
ond, and this includes such great
cities as Chicago, Detroit and Cleve-
land. In that region 21.l per cent
Of all the money spent on amuse-
ment and service Is paid out. Chi
cago undoubtedly gets the lions
share. There are tastes and tastes in
spending for amusement. The big
butter -and-egg man, the buyer from
Joplin, and so on, is likely to go to
New York for his fun, but the ranch
man and sheep herder is well con-
tent with Chicago The East North
Central region contains 20.8 per cent
OF the population, so it appears that
some outside money comes in.
Next in rank comes the Pacific
Coast 1t Is found that with 67 per
cent of the country's population, Ill
per cent Of the national expenditures
on amusementS and service are made
there. While Washington, Oregon
and California are all three included
in the region, it is likely that the
cities Of San Francisco and Los An
geles account for most of the spend
ing From all one reads about Holly
wood, the service item there must be
pretty heavy. what with movie stars
hiring u servants to serve breakfast,
to say nothing of doubles to take
dangerous risks.
Vacation and Good Time Centers.
New England has sc per cent of
the population and 70 per cent Of the
total national bill for amusement and
service is paid in that region. Boston
is the metropolis and probably ac-
counts for good deal of the spend
ing. One can be certain that al
though there is not much of a spread
between the population percentage
and the amusement-spending per-
centage, large proportion Of this
non-productive distribution Is made
by persons from other regions.
It will be noted that in each Of
those four regions the percentage Of
the national total spent on amuse-
ments and service is greater than the
percentage of the whole population.
This shows two things: One is that
there is more surplus income to spend
on non-essentials. The second is that
people from other parts of the coun-
try go to these four regions for vaca-
tions and a good time.
The Census Bureau. for statistical
purposes, divides the Nation in nine
general regions. In the four ac-
counted for above, percentage of this
type of spending exceeds share OF