LOWER PRICES IN THE UNITED STATES THAN IN ENGLAND.

The claim is often made that while wages are higher in the United States the cost of living is correspondingly cheaper in Great Britain. That this statement is erroneous can be proved by official statistics obtained simultaneously in both countries. In 1892 the Senate Committee on Finance made an extensive report on “Retail Prices and Wages" in leading cities of the United States and Europe at different periods from June, 1889, to September, 1891. Among the cities considered in this report were St. Louis, Mo., and Manchester, England, cities for which wage comparisons have just been made. A comparison of the prices of articles of identically the same description, obtained at the same time, namely, June, 1889, and September, 1891, in both cities, shows that instead of the necessary commodities of life being higher in the United States than in England, they are, on the contrary, as a rule, much lower. This is shown in the table which follows. A glance at this table shows that most of the necessary food products, such as bread, eggs, lard, bacon, roast beef, hams, mutton, milk, starch, and canned vegetables; were much lower in St. Louis than in Manchester, while the prices of the few remaining food products averaged about the same in both countries.

With regard to clothing and cloth goods, we find that men's hosiery, cotton shirts, sheetings, shirtings, and cotton and woolen dress goods of the same description and quality, were cheaper in St. Louis than in Manchester; that carpets, flannels, and cotton underwear averaged about the same, and that only in the case of men's hats was there any decided difference in favor of the Manchester purchaser.

Household articles, such as earthenware, glassware, and cutlery, were nearly the same in price in St. Louis as in Manchester, with