NORMS AND TRENDS IN EXPENSES 8s
City, the ratios decreased between 1921 and 1922, and 1922 and
1923. While 1923 was both high and low—high for some and
low for other districts—the direction of change was upward in
all but two districts between 1923 and 1924. From the level of
1924, which was high as compared with the seven-year level, the
direction of change to 1925 was generally downward. That is,
as a general rule, two facts are apparent: (1) a given direction
of change tends to be common to all districts at the same time,
and (2) the nature of the change is related to the level at which
the ratios in a given district stand. Table 59 shows the degree
of uniformity in the behavior of the district ratios with respect
to the first generalization; Table 6o serves a similar purpose for
the second.
Table 59 shows that out of the 72 direction-changes of the re-
spective district ratios from year
to year from 1919 to 1925, 39
were upward and 33 were down-
ward. But when these changes
are differentiated according to
the position held by the ratios
in the first of each pair of
years, relative to the level for
the period 1919 to 1925, it is
found that of the 39 increases,
30 were associated with ratios
holding “low” positions, and of
the 33 decreases, 30 are asso-
siated with ratios holding “high” positions. That is, if the
ratios were high in a given year, they tended to be lower in the
following year; conversely, if they were low, they tended to
increase. To these general rules there are but 12 exceptions—
one-sixth of the total.
Moreover, it is interesting to observe that it is apparently easier
—the basis of generalization being the frequencies 9 and 3—for
expenses which are high to increase, uncommon as this is, than for
those which are low to decrease. Too much significance ought
not to be attached to this conclusion—the instances are few—yet
such a finding agrees with what one would expect. It will be
recalled that a similar type of analysis for gross earnings indi-
“3 No change.
