10 COST OF LIVING IN THE UNITED STATES 
living in the United States.! This relates entirely to the 
requirements of workingmen’s families. Although a large 
body of data exists regarding index numbers and family 
budgets in other countries, these are not treated here; nor 
is there included in this treatise any discussion of the uses to 
which American data have been put.? After an analysis of 
the problems involved in determining the actual cost of living 
and the relative cost from time to time or from place to 
place, the discussion proceeds to a description of the principal 
index numbers by means of which changes in the cost of 
living have been measured. These are then compared and 
their differences noted. Finally, there is an estimate of 
changes in the cost of living between July, 1914 and Decem- 
ber, 1925, for the United States as a whole, as measured by 
the index numbers of the National Industrial Conference 
Board. 
t Family budgets were so completely discussed in Research Report No. 41, 0p. cit., 
that only the briefest summary is presented here. 
2 A recent publication notes many such instances. See Elma B. Carr, “The 
Use of Cost of Living Figures in Wage Adjustments,” United States Bureau of 
Labor Statistics, Bulletin No. 369, Washington, May, 1925.