Modern Economic Problems Part 12

340, 341 (and references there given in note), 348 ff. and 361 ff.

There are thus good reasons for discussing crises in connection with profits, as well as with money and banking.]

[Footnote 2: See Vol. I, pp. 51, 154, 300-302.]

[Footnote 3: See below, ch. 15, sec. 5, on the tariff legislation at this time.]

[Footnote 4: See ch. 8, sec. 1.]

[Footnote 5: See ch. 6, sec 5.]

[Footnote 6: See diagram of business failures 1890-1914, in Vol. I p.

364.]

[Footnote 7: In the first annual report of the United States Commissioner of Labor is given a long catalog of theories that have been suggested, many of them quite fantastic.]

[Footnote 8: See Vol. I, ch. 38, on Abstinence and Production.

Believers in the glut theory usually condemn efforts to encourage frugality among the ma.s.ses, calling it the "fallacy of saving."]

[Footnote 9: See Vol. I, ch. 37, secs, 6 and 9.]

[Footnote 10: See e.g., Vol. I, pp. 271. 335, 365 367.]

[Footnote 11: See Vol. I, p. 304.]

[Footnote 12: See above, ch. 6, on the standard of deferred payments.]

[Footnote 13: See note on tariff legislation and business crises, end of ch. 15.]

[Footnote 14: In both cases there is what is called in statistics a high degree of correlation (viz., .719 and .800), indicating that there is that percentage of probability that there is some causal relation between the two sets of figures.]

[Footnote 15: See above, ch. 9, secs. 5, 6, 8.]

CHAPTER 11

INSt.i.tUTIONS FOR SAVING AND INVESTMENT

-- 1. The nature of saving. -- 2. Economic limit of saving. -- 3. Commercial bank deposits of an investment nature. -- 4. Investment banking.

-- 5. Savings banks in the United States. -- 6. Typical mutual savings banks. -- 7. Postal savings plan. -- 8. Advantages of the postal savings plan. -- 9. Collection of savings and education in thrift. -- 10.

Building and loan a.s.sociations. -- 11. The main features. -- 12. The continuous plan. -- 13. The distribution of earnings. -- 14. Possible developments of savings inst.i.tutions.

-- 1. #The nature of saving.# The motives actuating the different cla.s.ses of lenders may, for our present purpose, be reduced to two: to postpone the consumption of income, and to obtain a net income from wealth (or investment). Saving always is relative to a particular period and is for more or less distant ends. The child saves its pennies to go to the circus next week, the working girl saves her dimes for a new hat next spring, the earnest high school pupil saves to go to college next year, and the provident man saves for his family's future needs and for his own old age. But always, to const.i.tute saving, there must be for the time a net result: the excess of income over consumptive outgo in that period. This is easily distinguishable from various forms of pseudo-saving of which many persons that are really spending all their incomes are very proud.

Such forms are: planning to buy a particular thing and then deciding not to do so, but buying something else; finding the price less than was expected, and thereupon using this so-called saving for another purpose; spending less than some one else for a particular purpose, such as food, but off-setting this by larger outlay for another purpose, such as clothing; spending all one's own income but less than some one else with a larger income. We may define saving as the conversion, into expenditure for consumptive use, of less than one's net income within a given income period.

Saving goes on in a natural economy both by acc.u.mulation of indirect agents and by elaboration so as to improve their quality.[1] It goes on to-day by the replacement of perishable by durative agents, as in replacing a wooden house by one of stone or concrete, and by producing wealth without consuming it, as in increasing the number of cattle on one's farm. But saving has come to be increasingly made in the form of money (or of monetary funds), and in this chapter we shall consider some of the ways in which this can now be done.

-- 2. #Economic limit of saving#. There is an economic limit to saving, as judged from the standpoint of each individual.[2] The ultimate purpose of every act of saving is the provision of future incomes, either as total sums to be used later or as new (net) incomes to be received at successive periods. The economic limit of saving in each case is dependent upon the person's present needs in relation to present income and conditions, as compared with the prospect of his future needs in relation to his future income and conditions. Each free economic subject must form a judgment and make his choice as best he can and in the light of experience. There is no absolute and infallible standard of judgment that can be applied by outsiders to each case. Yet there is occasion to deplore the improvidence that is fostered and that prevails, especially among those receiving their incomes in the form of wage or salary. Considered with reference to the possible maximum of welfare of the individuals themselves, the apportionment of their incomes in time is frequently woful. It is uneconomic for families of small income to save through buying less food than is needed to keep them in health; but it is likewise uneconomic to spend the income, when work is plentiful and wages good, for expensive foods having little nutriment and then, for lack of savings, to go badly underfed when work is slack and wages are small.

There is for each cla.s.s of circ.u.mstances a golden mean of saving. The saving habit may develop to irrational excess and become miserliness, but this happens rarely compared with the many cases where men in the period of their largest earnings spend up to the limit on a gay life and make no provision for any of the mischances of life--business reverses, loss of employment, accidents, temporary sickness, permanent invalidity, or unprovided old age. Despite the development of late of new agencies and opportunities for saving there is need of doing more toward popular education in thrift.[3]

-- 3. #Commercial bank deposits of an investment nature.# If a commercial bank pays no interest on demand deposits there is no motive for the depositor to keep a balance larger than he needs as current purchasing power. When his bank account increases beyond that point, it becomes available for a more or less lasting investment to yield financial income. If the sum is small or if the owner is at all uncertain as to his plans or if he is not in a position to find another attractive form of investment, the offer by the bank of a small rate of interest on special time deposits (2 to 3 per cent is not an unusual rate in such cases) will suffice to cause him to leave such funds in the bank. Since about 1900 the practice has been greatly extended of paying interest even on "current balances" of regular checking accounts (demand deposits). If the new 5 per cent rule[4] as to reserves against time deposits operates to cause commercial banks generally to pay a rate ranging from 2-1/2 to 3-1/2 per cent on time deposits, their amount will doubtless increase greatly. But still, in the future as in the past, those depositors having funds that can be invested for considerable periods will seek a higher rate of interest than can be obtained from commercial banks.

In their loaning function the "commercial" banks (as the adjective indicates) serve mainly the special needs of the _commercial_ elements of the community--business men borrowing for short terms to carry out particular transactions. Loans made on short-time commercial paper (quick a.s.sets) are very suitable to the needs of a bank that has its liabilities largely in the form of demand deposits. Time deposits can be more safely loaned on the security of real estate and for longer periods.

Despite their limitations in this respect, the commercial banks must be recognized as of growing importance in the work of encouraging and collecting small savings, which in many cases are better invested in other ways. In 1916, the centenary of the beginning of savings banks in this country, a nation-wide propaganda was undertaken by the American Bankers' a.s.sociation for the encouragement of savings.

-- 4. #Investment banking#. Enormous amounts of securities issued by governments or by corporations (railroad or industrial) are now on the market and to be bought conveniently by private investors. Through special bond houses some bonds are to be had in denominations as small as $100 and $500. The regular brokers on the stock exchanges buy and sell, for a small commission, the regular bonds and investment stocks.

Several large statistical and financial expert agencies[5] in return for an annual subscription, offer advice to investors regarding general market conditions and special securities.

For a large number of investors the personal examination and selection of sound securities is too difficult a task. To serve their needs many bonds and trust companies have of late developed special departments for investment banking. Through these agencies the banks are constantly placing as relatively permanent investments securities which they have bought or have aided "to float" or which they handle only as commission agents. In any case the real investment banker is bringing to his task special training and a high sense of his professional obligations, and is employing the services of statisticians, financial experts, and of practical engineers to determine exactly the fundamental conditions of each investment.

Investment banking promises to increase steadily in amount and importance.

-- 5. #Savings banks in the United States.# For the increasing number of wage-earners, salaried employees, and persons following professions, investment as active capitalists is impossible.[6] Their savings must take the form of pa.s.sive investments. But there are few good opportunities for lending money in small amounts, without great risk, and the requirement of skill, time, and labor to look after the loans and to collect the interest is prohibitive to a small lender. To provide a place where small sums could be kept with safety and so as to yield a moderate rate of income, the first modern savings bank in the United States was inst.i.tuted in New York in 1816 after a plan already developed in England.

In form these banks are mutual, having no capital stock on which dividends are to be paid. The boards of trustees are self-perpetuating and receive only fees for attending meetings. In their legal aspect these banks have a philanthropic character. Their investments are limited by law to specified, conservative cla.s.ses of securities and loans on real estate. The total increase from investments is, after paying the expenses of operation and setting aside a surplus, distributable to the depositors at regular periods. In the United States the number of such inst.i.tutions reported in 1914 was 2100.[7]

They have over 11,000,000 depositors, deposits to the amount of $5,000,000,000, an average deposit of $444 per depositor, or of $50 per capita of the whole population. These figures are very unequally distributed geographically, the divisions ranking as to total deposits in the following order: the Eastern Middle, New England, Middle Western, Pacific, Southern, and Western divisions. The first two of these groups of states have about 75 per cent of all the deposits, the Southern states hardly 2 per cent, and the Western (North Dakota to Oklahoma) only 1/4 of 1 per cent.

-- 6. #Typical mutual savings banks#. About one third of these banks are on the mutual plan, having no capital stock (most of them in the East) and these contain about four fifths of all the deposits.

The stock savings banks have individual deposits of over a billion dollars, and have outstanding capital stock to the amount of about $90,000,000 (about 9 per cent of their deposits). These stock savings banks to a much greater extent than do the mutual banks transact also a commercial business.

The banks on the mutual plan are therefore the most important, the typical savings banks. The average rate of interest they paid to depositors in 1914 was 3.86 per cent. About one half of their resources are invested in loans, mostly to small borrowers on the security of real estate, and most of the remainder consists of bonds and other securities of the safer kinds.

Savings banks are subject to the supervision and inspection of the banking departments in the several states, a fact that exerts a salutary effect though not insuring absolutely against either mistaken judgment or dishonesty on the part of the bank officials.[8]

Savings banks seek to keep invested as large a part as possible of their a.s.sets, keeping only in ready cash enough to meet a possible temporary excess of withdrawals over deposits. In contrast with the policy of commercial banks with their demand deposits, the sound policy for savings banks is to reserve the right to require notice of intention to withdraw. The period of such notice varies from a minimum of ten days to a maximum of about sixty days. In ordinary circ.u.mstances it is not needful or usual for a bank to exercise this right, but it is a needful safeguard in times of commercial crises.

This requirement of notice is greatly to the advantage of depositors collectively and thus of the community as a whole. It is not an undue limitation of the rights of the individual depositor. It is unfair for the individual, in a period of financial stress, to seek his own safety in a manner which is impossible for all, and thus to endanger the interests of all.[9]

The mutual savings banks in 1914 had (on the average) but six tenths of a cent of actual cash (and "checks and cash items") in their tills for every dollar of deposits, but in addition they had for every dollar of deposits four cents due on demand from state and national (commercial) banks. In the aggregate these demand deposits amounted to the large sum of $172,000,000, a large part of which bore a low rate of interest.

The depositors in savings banks have a direct legal claim on the bank as a corporation. The bank's only means of payment are its a.s.sets, consisting of claims upon the owners of such wealth as houses, factories, railroads, electric light plants, good roads, and school buildings. Thus virtually the depositors have by their savings made possible the building and equipping of these actual forms of wealth, and have an equitable claim upon the usance of them, which claim is met by the payment of interest and dividends to the savings banks.

Viewed in this way the great social importance of the savings function appears, and the importance of developing the savings inst.i.tutions.

-- 7. #Postal savings plan.# In many countries of the world the governments have not only authorized private, corporate, and trustee savings banks, but have provided public agencies where it is possible for the citizens to deposit small amounts. Thus munic.i.p.al, and what are called communal, savings banks are operated by many European cities; but the most effective and widely used agencies for the purpose are the national post-offices. Postal savings banks, or postal savings systems as divisions of the postal service, are now found in all the larger countries of the world, and in many smaller ones. The United States of America was almost the last civilized country to establish such a system, which was authorized by act of Congress in 1910, and went into operation in a few designated cities in January, 1911. The number of offices at which it was in operation was rapidly increased, and the number in 1914 was about 10,000.

Any one ten years of age may become a depositor. Deposit must be made always in multiples of one dollar. Not more than $100 will be accepted for deposit in any one calendar month, and nothing after the total balance to the depositor's credit is as much as $1000, exclusive of acc.u.mulated interest. However, amounts less than one dollar may be saved for deposit by purchasing a ten-cent postal savings card and affixing ten-cent postal savings stamps until the nine blank s.p.a.ces are filled. Such a filled card will be accepted as a deposit of one dollar either in opening an account or in adding to an existing account.

Deposits are not entered in a depositor's book, as is the usual practice of savings banks, but are evidenced by certificates issued in fixed denominations of $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100. These bear interest, from the first day of the month next following that in which the deposit is made, at the rate of 2 per cent per annum for a whole year (interest is not paid for any fraction of a year). Interest is not compounded, unless the depositor withdraws the interest and redeposits it, but simple interest continues to accrue annually on a certificate so long as it is outstanding, without limitation as to time.

By the end of the first year (1911) of operation the savings system held a balance to the credit of depositors of nearly $11,000,000; in the next year (1912) there was added to this about $17,000,000; in the next year (1913) about $12,000,000; and this average rate of one million dollars a month net addition to deposits has continued to the present (1916). These funds are deposited in banks belonging to the federal reserve system, which must deposit with the Treasurer of the United States designated kinds of bonds (national, state, and munic.i.p.al) as security and pay interest at the rate of 2-1/2 per cent on the amount of the deposits. The one-half per cent difference between this rate and that paid to individuals goes far toward paying the expense of operating the system.

Provision is made for the issue of postal savings bonds in exchange for certificates issued in sums of $20 or multiples thereof up to $500. These bonds bear interest at the rate of 2-1/2 per cent payable in semi-annual instalments, January 1 and July 1. These bonds are not counted as a part of the $500 maximum of deposits allowed to one person, and there is no limit to the amount of bonds which may be acquired by one depositor. Postal savings bonds are exempt from all kinds of taxes, federal and local. These bonds are issued only on the surrender of postal savings deposits, but may be sold by the owner at any time. Three years after the law went into effect, there were $4,635,820 of postal savings bonds outstanding.

-- 8. #Advantages of the postal savings plan.# As compared with corporate savings banks the postal savings system has certain advantages.

(a) It protects the small depositors from the danger of dishonest private bankers who have preyed upon the immigrants in the larger cities. To foreigners, accustomed to the postal savings plan in their home countries, it is especially useful.

(b) It gives to every depositor the greatest safety possible, as "the faith of the United States is solemnly pledged" for the repayment of depositors.