Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 310, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 December 1913 — TYPICAL HOOSIERS TO APPLY TEST [ARTICLE]

TYPICAL HOOSIERS TO APPLY TEST

State Food Commissioner Wants to Find Cost of laving in Many ' -■ Families in Indiana. H. E. Barnard, state food and drug commissioner, has completed placing a hundred “cost of living” charts yith typical Hoosier families, whose incomes range from SSOO to $5,000. annually, these charts to become the basis for an exhaustive survey into home economics in Indiana by the state food department which is under the state board of health. Mr. Barnard took the idea for the cost of living survey from “tips” obtained/ at the hearing before the public service commission in the Indianapolis street car controversy. The survey, although based upon similar ones undertaken by students of economics throughout the, world, will be different in many respects from any undertaken before. Family expense sheets, bound in pads, have been distributed to 100 families in all ranks of Hoosier life. Lawyers, chemists, laborers, street car conductors, painters and many others have received the pads and they have agreed to keep rigid account 6f the cost of all items of living during the new year. At the close of the year these will be analyzed and a survey of the cost of living in the average Indiana family obtained. How; much Hoosiers spend for meats, fruits, vegetables, vacations, churches, charities and similar expenses will be accurately gauged in these one hundred families, according to Mr. Barnard.