CHEMNITZ. 
145 
feature, the disadvantages of which are accentuated by the fact that all closets 
are situated within the building. From what has been said above, it appears 
that the following are the predominant rents for three and four-roomed working- 
class tenements :— 
Predominant Rents of Working-class Dwellings. 
Number of Rooms per Tenement. 
Three rooms 
Four rooms ... 
Predominant Weekly Rent. 
2s. 4d. to 3s. 3d. 
4s. to 4s. 7 d. 
Compared with rents in other towns, it will be seen that these rents are 
decidedly low. Taking rents in Berlin as 100, the corresponding figure for 
Chemnitz would be 40. 
With regard to the rents stated above, it has to be noted that they include 
no element of local taxation beyond the water rate. The amount payable by a 
workman in respect of local taxation is levied in the shape of a municipal 
income tax to which all incomes of over £20 a year are subject. This tax is 
additional to and quite independent of the State income tax, of which an account 
is given in the report on Dresden. 
The amount of the municipal income tax payable in Chemnitz on the 
various classes of income within which the yearly earnings of manual workers 
in that town would fall is shown in the following Table :— 
Annual Income. 
Yearly Amount of 
Municipal Income Tax. 
Over 
£20 
£25 
£30 
£35 
£40 
£47 
£55 
£62 
£70 
£80 
£95 
to £25 ... 
„ £30 ... 
„ £35 ... 
„ £40 ... 
„ £47 10s. 
10s. to £55 
to £62 10s. 
10s. to £70 
to £80 ... 
„ £95 ... 
„ £110 ... 
6s. 
8s. 
10s. 
12s. 
15s. 
18s. 
21s. 
25s. 2d. 
30s. 
36s. 
45s. Id. 
It may be added that, in the case of a family of which several members 
are earning, the municipal, like the State income tax, is levied separately on the 
income of each member whose income exceeds the limit of exemption (£20), 
and not on the family income as a whole. 
Retail Prices. 
There are few Grerman towns, if any, where co-operative societies have 
been more successful than in Chemnitz in securing the custom of the working- 
class population in the matter of household provisions other than butcher’s meat. 
This is hardly to be wondered at in a town with so pronounced an industrial 
atmosphere and with a large proportion of its workpeople belonging to Trade 
Unions, in which the need for organised effort on the part of labour to get rid 
of every form of “ exploitation,” including that by the private trader, is being 
constantly inculcated. There are no less than five purely working-class 
co-operative societies for distribution in the town. The oldest and largest of 
these, the Aowgwmogrgm /wr has been in 
existence sin¿e 1866, and had at the end of 1905 a membership of 12,427, a 
share capital of £13,200, and a reserve fund of £5,500. It effected, m the course 
of 1905, sales amounting to £174,000 at 23 branch stores, in addition to a 
small amount (about £300) through private traders acting as its agents. A 
dividend at the rate of 13 per cent, was paid on purchases in 1905. Compared 
with this Society, the others are of minor importance, the largest (the Konsum-