COAL - Clpdigital.org

THE COAL TRADE BULLETIN. 49
STATISTICS ON LABOR
Switzerland voted in every canton a compulsory
INSURANCE IN EUROPE. insurance law against sickness and accident based,
In view of the approach of the seventh annual with a few modifications, upon the principles of
session of the international congress of working- the German law. This failed to satisfy the people,
men's insurance, to be held in Vienna, Austria, and it was rejected May 20, 1900, by a vote of
September 17 to 23, at the invitation of the 341,914 against 14S.035. The federal council some
Austrian government and the mayor of that city, time after asked the permanent commission of
United States Consul Haynes, at Rouen, France, workingmen's insurance to draft a new law better
has gathered and sent to the department of labor suited to the needs of the country. It is also a
and commerce the main facts concerning work­ question in Switzerland to create compulsory inmen's
insurance in various countries.
surance against old age. At present railroad and
In Belgium the insurance against accident and steamboat workmen are admitted to the pensions
disability is obligatory for miners. Moreover, created by these two enterprises. These pensions
since January 1, 1900, the government has a are under the control and supervision of the state.
national fund for retiring pensions which is vol­ A pension of $S7 is allowed by the government
untary and insures to each of its members when of New Zealand to the indigent aged who have
sixty-five years old a pension of $69.50.
inhabited the country uninterruptedly for twenty-
The insurance of miners has also been comfive years without any legal condemnation. Every
pulsory in Austria since 1889. The least insurance old person who has come to the pension age gets
is $41 for men and $20.50 for women. Insurance the entire pension if he has a personal revenue
against sickness and accident is also obligatory of $1,164 or less. For each $4.80 above the law
for those employed in industrial and agricultural diminishes his pension accordingly.
pursuits, but accident insurance can in no case ex­ There is perhaps no country in the world where
ceed 60 per cent, of the annual wages.
workmen are so protected by the state or are so
From the sixtieth year in Denmark, the needy cared for as in Germany. Even clerks, shop assist­
receive help in varying proportion, the State and ants and servants are compelled to insure. This
the commune contributing equally.
insurance is effected by pasting into a book certain
For the last fifteen years a workman's insurance stamps every week, and it is the duty of every em­
committee has existed in Sweden, and since 1886, ployer to see that this is faithfully done.
the riksdag has put aside yearly $428,800, which In the German empire there are three insurances
sum is to cover the first expense when the law for for workmen, all of which are obligatory and under
the insurance of workmen is voted.
the authority of the imperial insurance office—viz:
In Norway accident insurance for all industrially sickness, accident, old age or infirmity. This in­
employed whose salary does not exceed $290 is
compulsory.
In Hungary insurance is obligatory for employes
surance is mutual and its administration autonomous
under state control. It embraces, without
distinction of nationality, all persons working in
of both sexes working in industrial establishments Germany.
—mines, furnaces, quarries, docks, yards, railroads, Disability and old age insurance in the German
interior navigation, posts, telegraphs and tele­ empire is obligatory from the sixteenth year and
phones and in commerce—if their wages do not embraces every workman earning over $482. It
exceed $2.15 a day. All members are assured (1) is optional for workmen whose annual earnings
free medical treatment, together with meuicine, are more than $742. The resources for this in­
for twenty weeks; (2) food for at least twenty surance are furnished "by the employer, the em­
weeks; (3) aid in childbirth and (4) burial exployed and the state, the latter giving toward each
penses.
There exists in Italy a voluntary insurance
abainst sickness and disability andan obligatory
insurance against accidents. For a disability pension
one must have been insured for twenty-five
years and be sixty years old.
All workmen in Finland are authorized to insure
against sickness, the cost of which is borne
equally by the employer and employe. All differences
are settled by arbitration. Every workman
in an industrial establishment gaining more than
pension a uniform subvention of $12 and paying
the workman's dues during the time he is serving
his military term. All remaining expenses are
shared equally by the employer and employe, who
pay according to the five classes into which the
imperial insurance office has arranged the insured
—viz: (1) workmen gaining no more than $84
pay 3.3 cents per week; (2) a wage not greater
than $133 pays 4.8 cents weekly; (3) a maximum
wage of $205 pays 5.8 cents; (4) a maximum
wage of $277 pays 7.24 cents, and (5) a wage be­
$145 is compelled to insure against accidents. The tween $277 and $482.50 pays 8.68 cents weekly.
accident fund, to which the workman contributes The amount paid by the workman is deposited in
nothing, is created by the employers and the state. the bureau of his employer, who buys special
On October 25, 1899. the federal council of stamps and affixes them to the employe's receipt