DEPOSITORS AND DEPOSITS 
103 
bond investments, one arrives at $1,800,000 (in 
round numbers) as the interest earned for the 
year. This represents an average daily balance, 
drawing interest, of $72,000,000. 49 This sum 
came entirely from depositors, but for the same 
period the sum on which interest was allowed and 
entered to the credit of depositors was but $48,- 
209,350, or 67 per cent of that upon which the 
Government received interest. Viewed in an 
other way, if the Government had paid its 2 per 
cent to depositors on the same sum (less the 5 per 
cent reserve) as that upon which it received its 
2¿ per cent it would have paid depositors $1,516,- 
000 instead of $964,187. 
The explanation of the great discrepancy be 
tween interest paid and interest received consists 
chiefly in the fact that depositors forfeit their ac 
cumulated interest by withdrawing substantial 
sums before the end of the year interest period. 
Third Assistant Postmaster-General Dockery 
recently cited the following figures relating to 
this subject before a committee of the United 
States Senate: “Sixty-two per cent of the de 
posits are withdrawn before they have been on 
deposit one year; 53 per cent of the 38 per 
cent that remains is withdrawn within the second 
49 On this basis the total average daily balance (inclusive 
of the 5 per cent reserve at Washington) would have been 
about $75,800,000.