RELATION BETWEEN PAY AND STANDARD OF LIVING 
13 
that is, a family consisting of husband, wife, and three children, the 
sex and age of the children varying somewhat with different in- 
vestigators. Such selection, however, could not be made from sched- 
ules available for this study. Further, the results obtained from this 
selection, could it be made, would not be representative of the 
localities studied. 
The pert-capita unit, the adult equivalent, the adult-male equiva- 
lent and the ammain 7 represents efforts to reduce families of vary- 
ing composition to a common unit of comparison. The per-capita 
unit is the simplest but fails to take account of the variations in 
individual demands due to sex and age. The adult equivalent unit, 
which usually counts two children as equal in their requirements to 
one adult, also ignores sex and accurate age requirements: this dis- 
crepancy has sometimes been partially removed by dividing the 
children among several age groups and increasing the allowance for 
each group in accordance with the age: but even so. sex is dis- 
regarded and the results are unsatisfactory. 
The ; * ammain " scale. 7 developed by \Y. I. King and Edgar 
Sydenstricker for the United States Public Health Service, 8 bases 
the total expenditures for goods used by the separate individuals com- 
posing any family against the total cost of goods used by the male 
19 to 35 years of age at the maximum of consumption as follows : 
Age group 
Male 
Age group 
Female 
Under 2 years 
2 to 4 years 
5 to 9 years 
10 to 12 years. __ 
13 years 
14 to 15 years 
16 years 
17 to 18 years 
19 to 35 years 
36 to 55 years 
56 to 75 years 
75 years and over 
Under 2 years 
2 to 4 years 
5 to 9 years 
10 to 12 years 
13 to 14 years 
15 to 18 years 
19 to 36 vears 
37 to 64 years 
65 vears and over 
0. 2 
. 3 
. 4 
. 5 
.6 
. 7 
. 8 
. 7 
.6 
The ammain scale would be wholly acceptable as a means of de- 
termining the relation of the ability to pay to the standard of living, 
provided the same relative demands were made by the third, fourth, 
or other additional member of the family on any one group of goods 
used. In addition to variations in consumption due to age and sex, 
variations in the costs of food, clothing, housing, etc.. due to size of 
family are taken into account in a set of scales devised by the United 
States Department of Agriculture. 9 This set of scales, known as 
the household-size index, weights the consumption demands of dif- 
ferent individuals on each of the separate groups of goods as classi- 
fied in this study. The requirements of the adult male have been 
taken as the unit for a given group of goods, such as food or hous- 
7 Ammain is derived from the term "adult male maintenance." 
8 A Method of Classifying Families According: to Incomes in Studies of Disease Preva- 
lence. W. I. King and E. Sydenstricker, D. S. Treas. Dept., Pub. Health Serv. Pub. 
Health Repte., Vol. 35, No. 48, pp. 2829-2846. 1920. 
"Family Living in Farm Homes, U. S. Dept. Agr. P>ul. 1l'14, 1924. 
