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Show Cost of Subsistance It has just been computed that it costs $-185 a year for the bare minimum subsistance not the adequate support of an adult man, in California. Other states would vary slightly. A small child or an old man is cheaper, $50 at three years and $200 at 75, though a baby costs $120 the first year, including the cost of being born. This is the bottom American standard, below which we do not regard it as "living" at all. And yet it is probably twice as high, even allowing for differences in prices, as the average standard in most countries. Translate it -into wages. It means that if we were to make the traditional "middle class" standard universal, a family of five could just get over its most expensive period with three grown children in the high school and not working on $2400 a year. Of course, families of that income or less do not go through I his period that way. There are not three grown children all dependent at once, while "nobody works but father." Or they draw on past savings of future earnings. To the family of small means, the realization of full American opportunities still means planning, sacrifice, and usually at some period more than one person's work. We have not yet reached "an equal chance for everybody." We are merely nearer to it than anybody else in the world Chester 11. Rowell. |