8 
POSTAL SAVINGS 
the Territories. These figures were severely 
criticized by the banking fraternity on the ground 
that they referred only to mutual and stock sav 
ings banks, whereas the savings deposits of the 
country included also amounts deposited in the 
savings departments of other kinds of banks. A 
report was prepared for the Committee on Pos 
tal Savings Banks of the Savings Bank Section 
of the American Bankers Association, under date 
of May 3, 1909, criticizing the official statistics 
and offering supplementary figures showing that 
the savings of the American people amounted to 
about nine and a half billion dollars, exclusive of 
deposits in school savings banks, “private invest 
ments of small savings in bonds” and “the sav 
ings invested in homes and homesteads.” The 
bankers’ figures included the accumulations of 
building and loan associations ($745,993,000) 
and the assets of life insurance companies ($3,- 
159,581,000). Obviously the term “savings” is 
very elastic, and when it is carried beyond the 
field of small and relatively permanent deposits 
in banking institutions, and into the field of in 
vestments, it is given an extension difficult to 
limit and of little use in a study of savings bank 
facilities. 
In December, 1909, the National Monetary 
Commission published its special report giving