PERTINENT COMMENT
PERTINENT COMMENT TWO people, at least, in every household are directly interested in "the increased cost of living." One is the husband and father; the other is the wife and mother. Father earns...
...The man reads in his paper that meat is higher, that eggs and butter are soaring, that fresh vegetables and milk are reaching new altitudes, and he says, as we have quoted him before: "It's something fierce the way things are going up...
...All of which is to remark that the man talks about the increased cost of living, and suggests theories as to what causes it, and the various remedies for it, while woman, who sees the tradesmen and dickers for supplies, is up against the real thing in its hardest, grimmest form...
...Father earns the money, gives a set sum of it to mother each week "to run the house on," and mother buys the stuff...
...He feels, in a general way, the pressure of high prices, but when he goes home he is surprised and hurt if his wife intimates, ever so gently, that she has a hard time making both ends meet...
...Then the man grumbles something about his not being able to save a cent, and the woman goes on robbing Peter, the butcher, to pay Paul, the grocer, in order that she may "keep within her allowance" and deprive the man of none of the choice cuts and little table luxuries that he must have...
...Don't I give you the same allowance I've given you for five years...
...he asks, with a challenge in his tone...
...Yes, but you know things cost more than they used to," she replies...
...Also, that she is expected to buy this year's food with last year's allowance...
...lt may not be prudent to conclude that unless conditions change materially President Taft himself will inevitably become an insurgent, but it is certainly a reasonable inference that if he is determined to put through genuine reform measures he may be compelled to use his club against Cannonism and Al-drichism.—Baltimore Sun...
...Also—and despite the fact that tariff graft, cold storage speculation, and middleman extortion bear directly upon her—that she has no vote.—Puck...
Vol. 2 • February 1910 • No. 8
