LIFE INSURANCE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1715, 19 November 1887, Page 3

LIFE INSURANCE.

TO THE EDITOB.

Bib, — Will you permit me to remind polioy-hoidee m th» Government office, who are total abstainers, that aa opportunity is bow affoiderl them of transferring frrm tho general to the temperance section Attention lias already been drawn to the subject m your valuable columns, but I am afraid that the advantages to be derived from making the transfer are not generally understood, while the absence of any profit m the Acfc'iaries' last investigation hap, through ignorance of the facts, given an impression to some minds that to belong to the abstaining section is decidedly unprofitable. A little consideration will effectually remove such an erroneous impression From the time when the • Government office was established to the inauguration of the temperance section — a period of about 13 years— hundredsof teettoal folks took out policies, but not until the last few months have they been allowed to take advantage of the superior inducements to join the abstaining section, co that the amount insured m the separate section subsequent to 1882 lino been n< cessarily limited. When tho Actuaries' report was compiled, the temperance section bad been m existence but three years, and, as a writer m a Napier journal pertinently aßks, v/bat dividend could the general section have paid m 1871, after three years of its existence ? An emphatic proof of the benefit reaped by belonging to the temperance section is shown m the fact that non-abstaining members objected to the Government initiating the separate class. To quote the words of one of them : — " He and others had insured on the existing plan, — abstainers and non abstainers insuring each other. It would be manifestly unjust to withdraw now all the better lives, which abstainers undoubtedly were, and leave the drinkers, more or leaa moderate, to themselves." The experiet cc of Life Assurance Societies m the United Kingdom is decidedly m favor of abstainers, and proveß incontostibly their superior lorgi rltj. The following extract from an address on the subject by Sir William Collins, is all I will ttouble yon to reprint, ao it Is but the experience of all Societies which keep the two classes of lives separately : — "Taking the results of the last seventeen years, from 1866 to 1882, the expected deaths In the temperance section, according to the ordinary tables of mortality, were estimated at 2644 ; while the aotual deathß were only 1861 ; the BurvlvaU above expeotancy, beiDg 783, or 29J per cent. In the general section the expected deal ha, according to the same tables of mortality, were estimated at 4408 : while the actual deaths were 4339; the survivals being only 69, or 1$ per cent, over the tables— thus giving the temperance section r superiority o f no Jess than 28 per cent." In conoluslon I would remind those Interested that the time allowed to trarj flier ia limited, and ell applications madi beta Wellington by the 31st December I am, etc , fejDEwrx Ashburton, J.Bth "November. XBB7,