538 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 744 



ceive pensions, and the cost to the founda- 

 tion is $16,305. There are twenty-eight 

 other professors now eligible to receive al- 

 lowances. Should they be compelled to 

 retire or wish to do so, the total charge of 

 Harvard University on the foundation 

 would be about $75,000. 



Even with a stationary number of pro- 

 fessors and stationary salaries, there are 

 two circumstances which will add greatly 

 to the cost of the system. One of these is 

 the "age distribution of the population," 

 a factor which the trustees of the founda- 

 tion may not have considered, as it appears 

 to have been completely overlooked by both 

 advocates and opponents of the old-age pen- 

 sions in Great Britain. The population of 

 that country, through a high birth rate 

 from 1850 to 1900, has increased greatly 

 since the middle of the last century, and 

 the people form a youthful population. 

 There are probably two to three times as 

 many people over seventy years of age per 

 thousand of the population in France, with 

 its stationary population, as in Great 

 Britain. The British chancellor of the 

 exchequer will be awakened to the appar- 

 ently unexpected circumstance that the 

 number of those entitled to pensions from 

 the government will be doubled or tripled 

 apart from any increase in population. 

 Similar conditions obtain in our universi- 

 ties which have more than doubled the 

 number of their professors in the course of 

 the past twenty or thirty years. Nearly all 

 those appointed to professorahips were 

 young and are now growing old together. 

 In twenty^five years the relative number 

 of professors over sixty-five will probably 

 be doubled or tripled.- 



The other circumstance that wiU increase 

 the demands on the funds of the foundation 



^ In the faculty of pure science of CJolumbia 

 University there are flfty-two professors, the ages 

 of forty-seven of whom are given in " American 

 Men of Science." The distribution is: 



is the pensioning of widows. Professors 

 are nearly or quite as likely as not to leave 

 widows, and the expectation of life of their 

 widows will be nearly or quite as great as 

 their own when eligible for annuities. 

 Thus the cost of the widows' pensions will 

 ultimately be nearly or quite one fourth 

 the cost of the annuities. It is further to 

 be noted that all widows will receive pen- 

 sions, even though a considerable propor- 

 tion of those entitled to annuities do not 

 draw them. 



It consequently appears that with the 

 same number of professors and the same 

 salaries as at present. Harvard University 

 would after a few years be able to take 

 from the foundation at least $150,000 a 

 year in annuities and at least $35,000 in 

 widows' pensions. How much would actu- 

 ally be taken for annuities would, of course, 

 depend on whether or not retirement were 

 mandatory or generally adopted. 



The number of professors will not re- 

 main stationary, nor will salaries remain 

 stationary. Harvard has about doubled in 

 size in the past twenty years and quad- 

 rupled in size in the past forty years. 

 Even should this rate of growth not con- 

 tinue at Harvard, it will, I believe, be 

 maintained on the average and will be 

 exceeded in the state universities. Harvard 

 and Columbia may in forty years have four 



Age Number 



30-35 4 



35-40 8 



40^5 12 



45-50 9 



50-55 9 



55-60 1 



60-65 3 



65-70 



70-75 1 



The median expectation of life of these men is 

 at least twenty-five years, and we may expect that 

 more than one half of the thirty-four now between 

 forty and sixty-five will still be living twenty-five 

 years hence. In the place of one man over sixty- 

 five years of age and eligible to be pensioned for 

 age (there is now none retired on a pension), 

 there will be seventeen. 



