Volume 3
The insurance cyclopaedia : being a dictionary of the definition of terms used in connexion with the theory and practice of insurance in all its branches, a biographical summary ..., a bibliographical repertory ..., an historical treasury ..., and also containing a detailed account of the rise and progress of insurance in Europe and in America ... / by Cornelius Walford.
- Date:
- 1871-1878
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The insurance cyclopaedia : being a dictionary of the definition of terms used in connexion with the theory and practice of insurance in all its branches, a biographical summary ..., a bibliographical repertory ..., an historical treasury ..., and also containing a detailed account of the rise and progress of insurance in Europe and in America ... / by Cornelius Walford. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.
119/672 (page 115)
![\ EXPERIENCE TABLES OF MORT. (GENERALLY). of insured life, as ordinarily understood : but from the lists of nominees in two French tontines; and from supplemental data, partly of the same character. This was Depar- CIEUx's T. OF MoRT., of which we have already given a detailed account under that head. In 1778 we reach the first T. founded upon the records of insured life, in its true sense. This was the T. compiled by Mr. Brand from the records of the Amicable So. This T. has already been given under Amicable So., Mort. Experience of. It possesses to our mind an interest which no subsequent T ever has possessed. In the first place, it was drawn from lives ins. in a pioneer asso., having no rules for guidance in the conduct of its bus , save such as were framed out of its own experience. In the next place, the lives had all been accepted without any medical selection, under the circumstances which have been stated in our hist, of the So. The reader will find a study of this T. instructive. In 1811 another T. was compiled from the Amicable So. Experience,—this time by Mr. John Pensam, the Registrar of the So. Of it we have also given a brief account under Amicable So. Experience Tables. We have seen under Equitable So., Mort. Experience of, that Mr. Griffith Davies, writing about 1825, considered the mort. experience of that So. afforded more satisfactory data for determining the rate of mort. among assured lives than any regis, hitherto made public. In 1826 Mr. Charles Babbage pub. a T. purporting to be based upon the experience of the Eqidtable So. We have already given a full outline of this T. under Equitable So., Mort. Experience of. In the work in which this T. appears—A dviipai-ative Vie^u of the Various Inst, for the Assn. of Lives, 1826—occurs the following ol:)S. : It appears that many and powerful circumstances combine to render the rate of mort. among a select class of assurers much less than that which occurs amongst the inhabitants of large towns ; and admitting to the counteracting cause more weight than in my own opinion it deserves, still I think the reasons already stated—namely, the healthy state of life at the time of making the contract; the class of society in which assurers are found, exempting them from sources of unhe.ilthiness occurring among the poor ; the rejection of those who have not had the smallpox ; of those who have had the gout or fits, and several other complaints; and, finally, the declaration of the party, corroborated by two friends, that he is not subject to any disease tending to shorten life, and that he is not in the practice of habits calculated to produce the same effect—strongly preponderate, and from their joint action we ought to expect that the law of mort. amongst a body of persons so selected should differ considerably from that which takes place in a large country. It is therefore to be expected, that the Lauu of Mo7-t. which exists among assurers [the insured] should approach more nearly to that which takes place amongst select classes of mankind, such as amongst annuitants (where it is the interest of each proprietor to select a good life), than to more indiscriminate bodies of people. Although there exist good obs. of this kind, I am not aware of their having been employed as the basis of any T. of preras. for assu. Some of his further remarks on this subject we have already given under Equitable So., Mort. Experience of ; but there yet remains to be noted the following emphatic expression of his conviction : Undoubtedly the best table for regulating the affairs of assu. cos. would be one formed from an enumeration of all the individuals who have been assu. at all the offices : as none of the' experience which has been thus acquired has been made public, we can only avail ourselves of such obs. as, having been incidentally made, lead directly to an approximation to such a T. Mr. Francis Baily being asked by the Select Pari. Committee on Friendly Sos. in 1827: Should you consider that the T. of the ins. offices which relate generally to persons in a better class of life, would be applicable to persons in a poorer class of life? replied : I do not think the T. of the assu. offices are fit for that purpose ; not for general use—they are picked lives. In 1828 Mr. Wm. Morgan pub. in his Vieit) of the Rise and Progress of the Equitable So. a T., of which we have already given full details under Equitable So., Mortality Experience of. In 1829 Mr. John Finlaison, the then Gov. Actuary, pub. the mort. experience of various classes of Gov. annuitants, and nominees in some of the State tontines—constitut- ing a mass of most valuable information, concerning which we shall give full details under Government Annuitants Mort. T. (See i860.) The T. pub. were understood to furnish but a small portion of the results obtained by the investigation. In 1829 Mr. Charles Babbage, in a letter addressed to the Rt. Hon. T. P. Courtenay, urged upon him the importance of compiling and making public the mort. experience of the then existing life offices. We shall speak of this more at length under Mort. Obs. In 1834 Mr. Arthur Morgan pub. two T. of the Mort. of the Equitable So. constructed from differing data. These we have given under Equitable So., Mort. Exp. of. In 1835 Mr. Charles Ansell, F.R S., then Actuary to the Atlas Assu. Co., contributed to the Library of Useful Knowledge : A Treatise on F. Sos., in -which the Doctrine of Int. of Money and the Doctrine of Prob. are practically applied to the afairs of siich Sos.: with numerous T.; and an Appendix, containi?ig the Acts of Pari, relating to F. Sos. Among the T. were some formed from the actual experience of F. Sos. These will be more particularly referred to under F. Sos. ; Mort. T. ; Sickness. As showing, in a very marked manner, the importance which was attached to obtaining Experience T. based upon more extended data than had yet been constructed, it will be interesting to place on record the following petition which was prepared under date June, 1837, in view of being presented to the House of Commons, together with the signatures thereto. That it was never presented prob. may be accounted for by some special](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21915404_0003_0119.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
