NORMS AND TRENDS IN GROSS EARNINGS 79
seven years, New York for six, and Richmond and Chicago
for five of the seven years. Of the districts which are high,
relative to the seven-year average, Cleveland holds this position
three years, and all of the other districts the full period of seven
years.
But “high” and “low” are relative terms; the districts which
are “high,” as well as those which are “low,” are not equally high
or low for each of the seven years. This fact is graphically illustrated
 in Chart 16.
This chart serves several purposes. It indicates for ratios of
gross earnings to earning assets for each of the districts (1) the
direction and percentage amounts of change from year to year and
over the whole period, (2) the position held by each district relative
 to that for the country as a whole, and (3) the nature and
percentage amounts by which the ratios each year deviate from
the seven-year level. Several features of the chart claim one’s
interest. First, there is substantial agreement, among the twelve
districts, that gross earnings ratios increased between 1919 and
1921 and fell between 1921 and 1925, the ratios in 1925 for the
combined and for the majority of the districts being approximately
 the same as those in 1920. Second, the rates of change
from year to year and over the whole period in the several districts
 generally conformed to those for the districts combined. To
this generalization there are exceptions, the chief of which, for
the year-to-year changes, are Minneapolis and Richmond, the former
 experiencing a fall between 1919 and 1920, and the latter,
between 1920 and 1921. Moreover, the downward trend from
1921 to 1925 was not felt in the Fourth district (Cleveland) and
only moderately so in Richmond, both, however, except for 1921,
having actual ratios not markedly different from those for the
combined districts. The districts with gross earnings ratios changing
 most nearly in accord with those for the country as a whole
are Chicago, St. Louis, and Dallas; those behaving most divergently
 are Richmond and San Francisco. Third, the ratios in
Dallas each year are relatively the highest; those in Boston generally
 the lowest. As a rule, gross earnings (interest rates for the
most part) are consistently high in the South and Middle West
(Atlanta, Minneapolis, Kansas City, and Dallas); they are consistently
 low in New England and the East (Boston, New York,
and Philadelphia). Fourth, while each district has its own gross