384 



INSURANCE. 



TABLE A 



SYNOPSIS OF THE STANDING, ON THE IST OP NOVEMBER, 1861, OF THE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANIES 

 DOING BUSINESS IN MASSACHUSETTS, CONSIDERED AS MUTUAL COMPANIES. 



bers of Southern policies from the older com- 

 panies. The values of these Southern policies 

 were not wholly forfeited to the companies, 

 many of the holders having taken care to sur- 

 render before hostilities commenced, and large 

 amounts were paid by some of the companies 

 even afterwards. 



Claims by Death against Nineteen Life Insurance 

 Companies doing business in Massachusetts, for the 

 year ending Nov. 1, 1861. 



Collating the returns of the last and two pre- 

 vious years, we find the death terminations of 

 policies in all the companies for the three years 

 from November 1, 1858, to Nov. 1, 1861, to be 

 1,364, and the years of life exposed to death on 

 all policies in force during those years, counting 

 the policies of the deceased as having been in 

 force half a year, to be 154,761.05. The tables 

 L, II., and III. give the amounts of life exposed 



and the deaths at all the different ages, aggre- 

 gately, in classes, and by the years of the policy, 

 tending to show the effect of selection, and the 

 risk of short-term insurance compared with in- 

 surance on the whole life. It will be seen that, 

 as far as this observation goes, it tends to show 

 that in no part of the scale of life, unless it be 

 on the earlier years, where the amount exposed 

 is too small to warrant any conclusion, is the 

 mortality to be expected quite as high as that 

 of the standard adopted for the valuation. The 

 difference, indeed, is rather astonishing, and 

 such as can hardly be expected to be maintain- 

 ed in the future as the grand average. There 

 is room, however, for a great decline before 

 reaching the line of English experience. 



The proportion of deaths in New York is 

 large as compared with foreign cities. The city 

 of London has a population of millions ; it is 

 surrounded by low lands, and the sluggish 

 Thames, at times almost stagnant, receiving the 

 discharge of its sewers and the filth of its streets, 

 flows through it, and at times almost stagnates 

 in its midst. Yet the vital statistics give the 

 proportion as 1 in 45. 



The city of New York numbers about 1,000,- 

 000, lying on the sandy ridge of Manhattan Isl- 

 and ; is fanned by the breezes of the ocean, and 

 has both sides washed by the swift currents of 

 the North and East rivers ; yet its proportion 

 of deaths is as one to 36. Much of this may be, 

 and doubtless is, due to the large amount of 

 immigration annually of poor and distressed 

 persons, who crowd badly-ventilated dwellings 

 that are the centres of infection. The organi- 

 zation of wise sanitary measures, and their effi- 

 cient enforcement, will no doubt do much tow- 

 ards bringing down the proportion of deaths, 

 not only in this but in other cities of the Union, 

 within the operation of life companies. 



