The housing of the unskilled wage earner : America's next problem ...

Front matter

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION page

1. Housing and the War i

2. Purpose of This Study 6

3. Extent of Bad Housing Conditions in the United

States 7

(i) Evidence from Housing Surveys 7

(2) Evidence from Building Costs 8

A — The American Standard in Housing . . 8 B — Economic Aspects of the American Standard 12

(3) Confirmation Supplied by Racial Make-Up . . 17

4. The Housing Problem and Its Solution .... 18

(i) Two-fold Character of the Problem .... 18

(2) Two-fold Character of the Solution .... 19

(3) Necessity of Solving the Housing Problem . . 26

Chapter II

1. Housing History of New York ....... 29

(i) The Settlements and Jacob Riis . . . . . 29

(2) Earliest Mentions 30

(3) First Official Investigation — Legislative Com-

mittee of 18^/ 31

(4) Report of the Council of Hygiene and Public

(5) Tenement House Commission of 1884 .... 38

(6) Tenement House Committee of 18^4 .... 40

(7) Tenement House Commission of 1900 ... 42

2. Housing History of Other Localities .... 45

(i) Washington, D. C 46

PACE

(2) Boston 50

(3) San Francisco 51

(4) Baltimore 52

(5) Richmond 53

(6) Chicago 54

(7) St. Louis 54

(8) PhUadelphia 55

(9) Cincinnati 57

(10) Providence 57

(11) Columbus, 57

(12) Grand Rapids 57

(14) Minneapolis 58

(15) Newhurgh, N. Y 58

Chapter III Restrictive Housing Legislation In The United States

1. Restrictive and Constructive Legislation ... 60

2. Provisions of the Veiller Model Housing Law . . 64

(i) Requirements for New Dwellings 66

A — Light and Ventilation 66

B — Sanitation 69

C — Fire Protection 69

(2) Requirements for Existing Dwellings .... 70

(3) Maintenance 72

(4) Requirements and Remedies 73

3. Tenement House Laws and Administration in New

York 75

(i) Tenement House Act of 186/ 76

(2) Tenement House Act of i8yp yy

(3) Tenement House Act of 1887 77

(4) Tenemeyit House Act of 1895 77

(5) Tenement House Act of ipoi 77

4. States with Tenement House or Housing Laws . 80

(i) Pennsylvania 82

A — Housing Law for ist Class Cities

B — Tenement House Law for 2nd Class Cities

Contents *

PAGB

(2) New York 83

A — Tenement House Law for ist Class Cities B — Tenement House Law for 2nd Oass Cities

(5) New Jersey 83

(4) Connecticut 84

(5) Wisconsin 84

A — Statewide Law

B — Tenement House Law for ist Class Cities

(6) Indiana 85

(7) California 86

(8) Kentucky 87

(9) Massachusetts 87

A — Tenement House Law for Towns B — Tenement House Law for Cities

(10) Michigan 88

(11) Minnesota 88

5. City Legislation 89

6. Conclusion 90

Chapter IV Model Housing In The United States Under Private Initiative

1. Philanthropic Trust Funds 92

2. Limited Dividend Housing Companies 93

(i) Model Tenements 94

A — Workmen's Home Association — 1854 . 94 B — Boston Cooperative Building Company,

1871 95

C — Alfred T. White Tenements, 1878-1890 . 96

D — City and Suburban Homes Company, 1896 98

E — Other Model Tenements in New York . 100

(2) Two-Flat Houses loi

A — Sanitary Improvement Co. and Sanitary

Housing Co., Washington loi

B — The Schmidlapp Houses in Cincinnati . 104 C — Improved Housing Association of New

PAGE

(3) Single-Family Houses 105

A — Billerica, Mass 105

B — Westerly Gardens, N. J 106

C — Titus Town, Va 107

D — Torrance, Cal 108

3. OcTAviA Hill Enterprises 109

(i) Octavia Hill and Her Work in London . . .110

(2) Octavia Hill Association of Philadelphia . . .111

(3) Octavia Hill Idea Applied Elsewhere . . . .112

4. Industrial Housing by Employers 114

(i) Early Examples 115

(2) Pullman 116

(3) Foreign Examples 116

A — Port Sunlight 117

B — Bournville ' . 117

C — Essen 118

(4) Leclaire 118

(5) Goodyear Heights . .119

(6) Indian Hill 120

(7) Hopedale 121

(8) Roebling 121

(9) Kistler 122

(10) Marcus Hook 122

(11) Hauto and Nanticoke 123

(12) Morgan Park 124

(13) Eclipse Park 124

(14) Undesirable Examples 125

5. Chamber of Commerce Enterprises 129

(i) Albany Hom.e Building Company 129

(2) Elmira Home Building Company 129

(3) Bridgeport and Kenosha Companies . . . .130

(4) Later Developments 130

6. General Conclusions 131

Chapter V

1. Identity of the Housing Problem 133

2. Government Aid and Its Forms 136

(i) State or Municipal Housing 137

PACE

(2) Loans to Non-Commercial Housing Companies . 138

(3) Loans to Individual Workingmen 138

(4) Tax Exemptions 138

3. The Pioneers 140

(i) Great Britain 140

A — History and Content of Legislation (England, Scotland and Wales) 140

B — Results of Legislation (England and

Wales) 150

C — Ireland 162

(2) Belgium 164

A — History and Content of Legislation . . 164 B — Results of Legislation 168

(3) Germany 170

A — History and Content of Legislation . . 170 B — Results of Legislation 177

(a) Some typical examples in Ulm, Dus-

seldorf and Munich 177

(b) Summary of money expended, houses

built and persons housed . . . 183

4. Other European Nations, South America and Cuba 184

(i) France 185

(3) Austria 191

(4) Hungary 192

(5) Holland 193

(6) Norway 193

(7) Sweden I94

(8) Denmark 194

(10) Rumania 195

(11)' Switzerland 195

(12) Luxemburg 195

(15) Argentina 197

5. Self-Governing British Colonies 197

(i) New Zealand 199

(2) Australia 202

(3) Canada 204

Chapter VI

THE BEGINNINGS OF CONSTRUCTIVE HOUSING LEGISLATION IN THE UNITED STATES

PAGE

1. Massachusetts Homestead Commission .... i^OQ

(i) First Homestead Commission, ipop . . . .'209

(2) Permanent Homestead Commission, ipii . .211

(3) Town Planning Boards Established, iqi^ • -215

(4) Housing by the Commonwealth 218

2. Other Beginnings and Attempts at Beginnings . 222

(i) California Commission of Immigration and

Housing 222

(2) Oklahoma Home Ownership Loan Law . . • 225

(3) Borland-Pomerene Housing Loan Bill for the

District of Columbia 227

(4) Buchanan Postal Savings Deposits Housing

Loan Bill 229

3. Developments Which Will Fit in with a Con-

structive Housing Program .... 229 (i) Town Planning Legislation in the United States 229

(2) Zoning and Districting in the United States . . 230

(3) Building and Loan Associations in the United

States 232

4. War Housing by the Federal Government . . . 234

Chapter VII Objections To Constructive Housing Legis- Lation In The United States

1. Presumption in Favor of Constructive Housing

Legislation in the United States . . 238

2. Constitutional Objection 240

( 1 ) Limits of the Federal Constitution 240

(2) Class Legislation 241

(3) Police Power 243

3. Economic Objection 245

4. Social Objection 248

5. Philosophical Objection 251

6. Pessimistic Objection 253

Chapter VIII Outline Of A Comprehensive Housing Policy For The United States

PAGE

1. Which of the Four Types of Constructive Housing

Legislation Should We Have? . . . 257

(i) To be developed simultaneously ..... 260 (2) The Veiller Model Law 261

3. Constructive Legislation, National, State and

Local 261

(i) National Legislation 261

A — National Housing Commission . . > . 262

(a) Functions 262

(b) Funds 263

B — Postal Savings Deposit Loans to Individual Workingmen 266

C — Housing Loans by National Banks . . 267 D — Amendment of the Farm Loan Act . . 268

(2) State Legislation 269

A — State Housing and Town Planning . . 269

B — Functions 271

C — Funds 271

(3) Local Legislation — Housing and Town Plan-

ning Boards 272

(4) Needs of Different Economic Groups • . . 275

4. Conclusion 276

THE HOUSING OF THE UNSKILLED WAGE EARNER

Chapter I Introduction

I. HOUSING AND THE WAR

One of the incidental benefits of the war was that it awakened us to the importance of housing. No nation f^ can rise higher than the level of its homes. Whether we approach the subject from the point of view of health, morals, child conservation, industrial efficiency, Americanization, or good citizenship, the housing problem is fundamental.

We have been very slow. Germany realized a generation ago that neither industrial nor military efficiency could be expected from an improperly housed population, and Germany took steps accordingly. In 1889 industrial Belgium embarked on a policy that was to make her people a nation of home owners. Great Britain has given us the garden city. She has written on her statute books and established in her practice the doctrine of community responsibility for the housing of the people.

The war has quickened the public conscience in matters of social justice, it has taught us the need of conserving life and health, it has aroused a demand for real democracy. In so far as it has done these things, it has helped housing. But more directly and concretely, through the slacking up of shipbuilding and other war work because of the lack of housing accommodations for the workers, which occurred within a few months of our entry into the war, it has got through our easygoing, insulating indifference the idea that a man must have a place to live in as well as a place to work in, and that if we expect good men to keep on working under high pressure, they must have real homes to go back to when the day's work is done, — not simply a roof and a bed. Great shipbuilding and munition plants were to be created, others were to be vastly enlarged. Some of these plants were to employ as many as thirty thousand new men. Where were they to live? No one had given the matter the slightest thought. It has been an American habit to let such things adjust themselves through the free action of the law of supply and demand. Individualism has been our guiding star, and private initiative our fetish.

Under the strain of the war need the law of supply and demand, always painfully inadequate, broke down completely. Samuel Gompers called attention to the fact in August, 191 7. A housing section of the sub-committee on welfare work of the Committee on Labor of the Advisory Commission of the Council of National Defense was created with Philip Hiss as chairman. Hearings were held, various localities reporting housing shortages were visited, and a report drawn up which showed the seriousness of the situation. On October 9, 19 17, the Council of National Defense appointed a housing committee with Otto M. Eidlitz of New York as chairman, which made a second quick survey and presented a report, a summary of which was made public on November 2. After giving several instances of war work halted by housing shortage, this report says : " It is the opinion of the Committee on Housing that the existing emergency demands immediate action and it is convinced that under proper safeguards the Government should give quick financial aid to such industries or communities as can clearly demonstrate their right to relief. In this regard it is suggested that any aid that may be given by the Government should preferably be rendered in the form of loans at a low rate of interest. Some loss to the Government may be reasonably expected, but the expenditure necessary to give relief is negligible when measured by the loss incident to delay in the execution of the vast war orders already placed. It is the judgment of the committee that an organization of reasonable permanency and authority is necessary to administer quickly and effectively such funds as may be available for housing purposes, and that such organization should have broad powers to conduct building operations, to deal in real estate and securities, and to borrow and loan money. . . . The Committee on Housing particularly emphasizes the conviction that Government aid for industrial housing should be considered as a war measure and be rigidly confined to cases where restriction of output of war materials would otherwise occur.'*

Thus almost overnight was the great step taken of establishing Government aid in housing, which would under ordinary circumstances have required years of patient educational work. Of course it was only a war emergency measure, but it is hardly conceivable that such an experience will not exert a pro fund influence on our future housing policies.

The report of the Eidlitz committee did not produce immediate results. It had been fondly supposed that houses would be building by the thousand before snow was flying, but it was not till late in February, 191 8, that Congress appropriated fifty million dollars for housing under the Shipping Board and not until May that agreement was reached on a sixty-million-dollar appropriation for other war workers. During the summer of 19 1 8 an additional twenty-five million w^as appropriated for housing under the Shipping Board and an. additional forty million for housing under the Department of Labor, which was to administer the other fund. Nor have the executive authorities pursued an undeviating course. There have been numerous changes of plan and some fluctuations in policy. Many important? parts of a housing policy — such as the management and ultimate disposition of the communities to be built — are as yet undetermined. But the great preliminary step has been taken. Government money has been lent to corporations like the Bethlehem Steel Company, and the Newport News Shipbuilding Company, to the Wilmington Housing Company, recently organized under the auspices of the Wilmington Chamber of Commerce, and to a number of similar companies. The United States Housing Corporation functioning under the Department of Labor is building communities directly. Where the money is loaned, the Government still controls standards of housing and rental. The general policy of permanent one- family houses for married workers and temporary barracks for single workers has been adopted. The Bureau of Industrial Housing and Transportation has taken a further step in adopting a set of " standards," printed in a sixteen-page pamphlet, which follow the model law in many respects and go beyond it in not a few, notably in the amount of yard space required.

The National Housing Association and the American Institute of Architects have carried on an educational campaign by pubHcations and conferences to secure the adoption of thoroughly good standards of planning and building. The American Institute of Architects has been especially active in popularizing information about Well Hall and Gretna, and other beautiful garden cities erected for munition workers by the British Government. It pointed out that we, with the Atlantic between us and the enemy, ought to be able to do as much for our war workers as Great Britain had done with the enemy at her door.

The two organizations referred to formulated outlines of war housing policy which doubtless exerted considerable and deserved influence on the fluid plans of the Government. Meanwhile all sorts of persons with interested motives, would-be contractors, purveyors of various kinds of building material, or owners of " innocent tenement house property," were bombarding the authorities with advice. Much dust was raised and issues were confused. Nevertheless, with or without a policy, the Government began to act. In the September, 1918,^ issue of the Journal of the American Institute of Architects is to be found a list of 89 housing projects decided on up to that time by the Emergency Fleet Corporation, the Ordnance Department and the United States Housing Corporation. In many of these the work was well advanced, in some, houses were already occupied.^

Then, early in November, came the unexpected collapse of the Central Powers and the signing of the armistice. With that every Government housing project was halted. Even those well under way could not be

1 A later list is given in the February, 1919, number of Housing Betterment, a quarterly issued by the National Housing AssOQiation.

finished without the authorization of Congress. For a time it looked as if all these good beginnings would be scrapped, but better counsels prevailed, and it now seems probable that all of the Shipping Board projects and twenty- three of the Department of Labor projects will be carried to completion.

Much of the future housing policy, and consequently much of the future welfare of our country, hangs on the decisions to be made in the next few months.

2. PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY

The war housing problem is only a part of the larger housing problem. A war housing policy should be only a special application of a general housing policy.

There is a crying need for authentic facts on which to base a comprehensive housing policy and for critical interpretation of those facts. Only on such a basis can a rational policy be formulated.

This study has been undertaken as a contribution toward supplying these needs. It will be necessary to consider what American housing conditions are and how far they fall short of accepted standards, what methods of solving the housing problem have been tried in the United States and how far those methods have been successful. It will next be needful to consider the experience of foreign countries, the methods they have pursued in solving their housing problems, the extent of their success and the adaptability of their methods to our home conditions. By the time we reach that point, we ought to have acquired something in the nature of a philosophy of housing which should enable us to formulate an American housing policy equally useful in war or peace.

Introduction

3. EXTENT OF BAD HOUSING CONDITIONS IN THE UNITED

STATES

Roughly stated, one-third of the people of the United States are living under subnormal housing conditions, conditions which fall below the minimum standard we shall presently describe, and about a tenth are living under conditions which are an acute menace to health, morals and family life, conditions which tend to produce degenerative changes in those subject to them. We arrive at these figures, which are of course only approximate, by studying the very numerous housing surveys which have been made in various parts of the country, and confirm them by the economic considerations we shall presently summarize, further checking our calculations by census figures on the racial make-up of our population.

( I ) The Evidence from Housing Surveys

Not to go back of 1900, the literature of housing surveys in the United States is voluminous. The report of the last New York Tenement House Commission is of that date. President Roosevelt's Homes Commission dealt with Washington exhaustively in 1908. The Chicago School of Civics and Philanthropy has brought out a series of studies of housing conditions in Chicago among various racial groups. The Pittsburgh survey was the occasion of a number of housing studies in and near Pittsburgh. Boston had a Commission to Investigate Tenement House Conditions, appointed by the Mayor in 1903. A further investigation was made by a committee of business men in 19 10 and a bulletin detailing a number of typical housing evils was issued by the Women's Municipal League in 19 16. The reports of the California Commission of Immigration and Housing contain studies of housing conditions in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Stockton, Fresno and other towns. A Housing Commission appointed by the Governor issued a report for the state of Michigan in December, 1916. The Philadelphia Housing Commission has published various reports on local housing conditions. Housing surveys of Des Moines and St. Paul have appeared within the last few months. Baltimore, Richmond, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Grand Rapids, Providence, are a few among the cities •/that have had housing surveys. When we have read three or four of these reports, we might close our eyes and recite the rest. Only the proper names and the figures differ. The same conditions meet us everywhere — lot overcrowding and room overcrowding, dark rooms and inadequately lighted rooms, lack of water, lack of sanitary conveniences, dilapidation, excessive fire risks, basement and cellar dwellings. There are differences in emphasis. The besetting sin of Philadelphia may be privy vaults, while that of Boston is dark rooms; New York may have no inhabited alleys and Washington no tall tenements, but none can afford to throw stones.

The conditions revealed in these reports will be considered in the next chapter.

(2) The Evidence from Building Costs

A. The American Standard in Housing

We have touched on housing evils. Before we proceed to remedies, we must agree on a satisfactory standard. Have we a clear-cut idea as to what the American standard in housing involves ? We are dealing with minimum standards, below which society cannot, in its own interest, allow any section of its membership to sink.

What is a satisfactory minimum standard to apply to the home of an unskilled wage earner? Presumably there would be no dissent from the negative statement that no house should be permitted which is injurious to the health or morals of those who live in it.

Generalities, even positively expressed, command easy assent. There should be enough of light, air and space to make healthy children, enough rooms to permit privacy and the preservation of self-respect, as many modern conveniences as may be practicable. This last word opens the door wide to discussion. But standards are higher than they used to be. Few would be found to-day to question that an abundance of pure water is a necessity, or that where sewers have been laid, every dwelling should be connected with them. Yet Trinity *^ Church Corporation fought in the courts until 1895 the provisions of the New York Tenement House Act of 1887 requiring running water on each floor of a tenement house. And the acceptance of the principle of universal sewer connection in such cities as Baltimore and Philadelphia is a matter only of the last few years.

Discussion still rages over whether a bath-tub is a luxury or a necessity, but the trend of opinion, more marked with the passage of each year, is certainly in favor of including it in the American standard of housing.

Certain minimum standards of floor space, window space, cubic air space per occupant, size of courts and yards, plumbing, fire escapes, repairs and cleanliness have achieved a sort of crystallization through enactment into law.

The best opinion is strongly in favor of the single-family detached house with a yard around it, wherever such a type is practicable. But with ever so good a development of garden suburbs and ever so great improvement in transit facilities, even with tax reform thrown in, a large percentage of New Yorkers must continue to live near their work in multiple dwellings. And in lesser degree this is true of other great cities. Though Philadelphia, by a wise system of lot sub-division and minor streets, has found it possible to provide low-cost single-family houses in rows for a surprisingly large proportion of its working population.

The National Conference of Charities and Correction held at Cleveland in 19 12, through its Committee on Standards of Living and Labor, Owen R. Lovejoy, chairman, formulated its housing standard as follows (Proceedings, pp. 391, 392) :

" The Right to a Home. Social welfare demands for every family a safe and sanitary home; healthful surroundings; ample and pure running water inside the house; modem and sanitary toilet conveniences for its exclusive use, located inside the building; adequate sunlight and ventilation ; reasonable fire protection ; privacy ; rooms of sufficient size and number to decently house the members of the family; freedom from dampness; prompt, adequate collection of all waste materials. These fundamental requirements for normal living should be obtainable by every family, reasonably accessible from place of employment, at a rental not exceeding 20 per cent, of the family income."

Turning from social workers to business men, we find the Housing Committee of the Minneapolis Civic and Commerce Association, in September, 19 14, ending a report on " Housing Problems in Minneapolis " with these words (p. 109) :

" A new spirit is developing in industry, a spirit bom of the realization that all industry suffers through the misfortune of any factor. The employer fails to prosper as his men fail to prosper. Bad housing for the workman means bad business for the one who hires. In the Hght of this spirit, the primary question is not ' What can the tenant afford ? ' it is * What can Minneapolis afford ? ' If we are to develop in Minneapolis the highest type of civilization, if industry is to thrive permanently, if art and music are to serve their highest purposes, we must first recognize as an essential prerequisite to the realization of these high ideals, the providing of a home life for every family, rich or poor, that shall insure to them their inalienable rights of sanitation, safety, ventilation, privacy, sunlight, space and beauty."

A more recent and more concrete formulation of the American standard of housing will be found in John Nolen's report to the Bridgeport Chamber of Commerce (" More Houses for Bridgeport," Aug., 1916, p. 28) : ** Minimum House — four rooms, Living Room, Kitchen, two Bedrooms and Bath, five rooms preferred. Living Room, Kitchen, three Bedrooms and Bath; allows for separate bedrooms for older children of different sexes."

We have spoken of the American standard of housing, because that is what most concerns us, not because it differs in any essential particular from the standards of other countries. The only discoverable difference between English and American standards is that under the pressure of economic necessity, the English are more apt to sacrifice the bathroom and we the third bedroom. Under further pressure of low wages, they have (though decreasingly in recent years) accepted two- and three-room apartments in city tenements to an extent that would be without excuse in this country. And the lower wages on the continent have made the two- and three-room apartment far more prevalent there than in Engl^ncj. This is especially true of Germany. I am spes^k-

12 Hoiirsing of the Unskilled Wage Earner

ing of so-called model housing enterprises, whether by municipalities or private associations.

Discussions of standards of living are based on the theoretical standard family, consisting of father, mother, and three minor children. Naturally, any practical building program has to take into account the needs of both larger and smaller groups.

B. Economic Aspects of the American Standard

Mr. Nolen, who has already been quoted, in a paper read at the Fifth National Housing Conference in Providence (Oct. 9— II, 191 6) sums up the economic points of the situation very forcibly (Proceedings of the National Housing Association. Vol. V, p. 5) :

'' I. The minimum desirable house of four or five rooms cannot be provided in the United States, even under favorable conditions, for less than about $1,800 or $2,000 — that is for house and lot, with street improvements, essential public utilities and neighborhood recreation.

" 2. A house costing that sum cannot be offered on the basis of an economic rent of, say 5 per cent, or 6 per cent, net, for less than $15 per month.

"3. Unless a wage earner with a normal family of wife and three dependent children has an income of $15 a week, or $800 a year, he cannot afford to pay as much as $15 a month for rent.

" 4. More than one-half of all workingmen receive less than $15 a week."

The writer believes there is no escape from the logic of these facts, and Mr. Nolen's figures would have to be raised five or six hundred dollars to meet the increase in cost of building which has taken place since the fall of 1916.

The figures when given were necessarily a rough average. Enormous differences in the value of land exist between city, town and village, and there are very considerable differences in the cost of labor and building materials in different sections of the country.

Among the plans and costs of various types of workingmen's homes shown in " More Houses for Bridgeport," those which meet the requirements of Mr, Nolen's standard vary from $1,200 for a five-room-and-bath frame house at Kistler, Penn., to $3,285 for a six-room-and-bath stucco house erected by the Morton Grinding Company of Worcester, Mass.

The returns from the model housing questionnaires sent out in the summer of 19 16 by the National Housing Association bear out these figures.

The most economical single- family city house of acceptable standard is the Philadelphia four-room-and-bath row house which sold for $1,750 just before the war.

The Washington Sanitary Housing Company has succeeded in evolving a type of two-flat house, with three or four rooms and a bath in each flat, at a cost, a few years ago, of about $1,200 per family, including land. (" Small Houses Within the City Limits for Unskilled Wage Earners," George M. Sternberg, Surgeon General U. S. A., retired, Dec, 19 14.)

Mr. Schmidlapp's experience in Cincinnati has been similar as far as may be judged by the very differently presented figures. ( Low Priced Housing for Wage Earners," Oct., 19 16.)

Again, the May, 19 16, report of the City and Suburban Homes Company of New York gives figures from which it is easy to compute that the average cost per family for the 11,000 people housed in their model tenements was $2,240. Their apartments have water; private toilets, steam heat and in some cases bath, and contain two, three and four rooms.

It is clear that on a basis of lo per cent, gross income, commonl}^ reckoned necessary to secure a 6 per cent, net return, an $i,8oo house and lot must produce $i8o annual, or $15 monthly rental, and a $2,400 house and lot a rental of $20 a month. It is also evident that no one, knowingly, as a business investment, undertakes the trouble and risk of a building operation for less. Why should he, when he can invest his money in gilt edge bonds and mortgages without stirring from his easy chair and get as much return?

Even the semi-philanthropical enterprises have to clear 5 per cent, or they cannot get capital. The City and Suburban Homes Company, it is true, has been contented with 4 per cent., but its reports lament its restricted usefulness because of lack of capital. The Washington Sanitary Housing Company, which started out on a 4 per cent, basis, had to amend its charter and make it 5 per cent, before it could get money to build with. Some employers rent houses to their workmen at less than commercial returns, but as a rule this is where wages or houses or both are distinctly below par. It is rather surprising that the example of Sir William Lever at Port Sunlight has not appealed more forcibly to American employers.