Revision of Workmen's Compensation Rates (January-March 1917) [Discussion]

The divergence between financial exigency and scientific thought is well illustrated in the chief controversy of the recent rate revision over the use of graduated reduction factors, law differentials and expense loadings. The immediate cause for revision was the necessity for an advance in rates to provide adequate income for the carriers. The application of a flat percentage increase to all rates would have been the simplest means of accomplishing this end. But the demand for justice to individual classifications precluded any such aggregate method of procedure. So law differentials were revised, the experience of individual classifications and groups of classifications was considered, and a rough graduation of expense loading by states was retained. While the procedure and the results are a real improvement over those of the 1915 conference, they are still marked by the desire for action rather than accuracy and by an easy tolerance of assumptions and approximations which produce sufficient income.