LIST OF TABLES

PAGE

TABLE 1: Minimum Food Budget for a Week for a Man, Wife and
Three Children under Fourteen Years of Age, Fall River,
Massachusetts, October, 1919 4

TABLEv 2: More Liberal Weekly Food Budget for a Man, Wife and
Three Children under Fourteen Years of Age in Fall River,
Massachusetts, October, 1919 5

TABLE 3: Cost of a Liberal Allowance of Clothing for a Year
for a Man, Wife and Three Children under Fourteen Years of Age
in Fall River, Massachusetts, at Prices Prevailing in October,
1919 7

TABLE 4: Average Cost of Sundries in Fall River, Massachusetts,
October, 1919 11

TABLE 5: Average Cost of Living for a Man, Wife and Three
Children under Fourteen Years of Age in Fall River,
Massachusetts, October, 1919 12

TABLE 6: Average Increase between October, 1914, and October,
1919, in the Cost of Living for a Man, Wife and Three Children
under Fourteen Years of Age in Fall River, Massachusetts 15

TABLE 7: Comparison of Distribution of Expenditures for the
Separate Budget Items in Fall River, Massachusetts, in 1914
and 1919, with the Average Distribution in the Country as a
Whole in 1914 16

Foreword

The accompanying study of the cost of living among wage-earners in
Fall River, Massachusetts, aims to establish the cost of maintaining a
wage-earner's family at a minimum but reasonable standard of living in
this textile manufacturing center; also the cost of maintaining such a
family at a somewhat better standard.

The Board has already made several broad surveys of changes in the
cost of living in American wage-earning communities since the outbreak
of the World War in July, 1914. These cover the entire country and are
designed to bring out the extent of change during the periods studied,
not the actual cost of living. The results of the present investigation
in Fall River, made independently of these broader surveys, throw
an interesting sidelight on the wider studies and also permit of a
valuable check on them.

It is intended to make similar intensive studies from time to time in
other rep