MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 109 



This Senate table was discontinued early in the nineties and its suc- 

 cessor so far as the government is concerned is the table of the Bureau 

 of Labor which 1 have used for the price movements of this paper. 



The Bureau of Labor has made use of the retail prices of 30 and the 

 wholesale prices of 250 staple commodities, has collected them for nearly 

 teu years and shows plainly by its tabulations that the alarming- rise 

 of prices recently experienced is merely the prolongations of an upward 

 trend of a dozen or more years. 



The upward trend of the retail prices of 30 ordinary table food com- 

 modities as collected ty the government in 07 different places and from 

 1,105 ditTerent dealers is as follows: 1001 index numbers lOS.i/o points; 

 1002, 110.9: 1903, 110.9; 1904, lll.G; 1905, 112.5; 1900. 110.2; and 1907, 

 120.7 a total rise of 15.2 points in six years. It is also significant that 

 each and every one of the 30 commodities save sugar alone had a higher 

 price in 1907 than in 1901. 



Turning now from the commodities which merely minister to the table 

 and noticing the other family living expenses we find here a lapse in the 

 governmentally collected retail prices and consequently wholesale rates 

 must of necessity be considered. The Bureau of Labor has tabulated these 

 wholesale prices since 1901 for the extraordinarily large number of 250 

 commodities the most of which it has grouped under the following sig- 

 nificant heads — Foods, etc., 57 articles; cloths and clothing, 44 articles; 

 fuel and lighting. 13 articles; drugs and chemicals, 9 articles; house fur- 

 nishings, 14 articles and lumber and building materials, 28 articles. It 

 will be recalled from memories of the family budget that most of the 

 constituents of the material side of living group themselves naturally 

 under one or the other of the titles which have just been read so that the 

 relative prices of these different groups from year to year should show 

 significantly how living expenses have risen. Further than this they cor- 

 respond closely with the headings under which the familiar commodity 

 consumption statistics of our text books are collected and this confirms 

 us in the belief that these goods api>ertain to living. 



The retail prices of 30 food products as we have just seen appreciated 

 15.2 points in six years. The appreciation of 57 such products at whole- 

 sale rates during six years was not so gi^eat varying from 105.9 in 1901 

 to 117.S in 1907. During the same jieriod the cloth and clothing group 

 increased from an index number of 101 in 1901 to 11G.9 in 1907 or a 

 gain of 15.9 points. Three articles alone of this group, it should be 

 mentioned, hosiery, covert cloth overcoatings and Wamsutta shirtings 

 became cheaper during the progress of this period than they were at its 

 beginning. The thirteen membei*s of the fuel and lighting group appreci- 

 ated from 119.5 in 1901 to 130.8 in 1908— a rise of 11.3 points; lumber 

 and building materials as represented by 28 articles moved up 10.4 

 points and the 14 articles of house furnishings rose 13 points, while drugs 

 and chemicals alone of all the household essentials have steadily de- 

 clined in price during the decade selling for nearlv five i>oints less in 

 1908 than in 1901. 



In addition to this rather matter of fact record of the heightened 

 prices which nearly all the housdiold essentials have recently had, this 

 report of the labor bureau affords still another way of showing the same 

 outcome. This is through the differentiation of the prices of eonsump- 



