AS AN INVESTMENT   229

considering the insurance at all. It even caused life and limited payment life policies to be carried for investment purposes. And the desire for accumulation and its benefits has kept these policies in demand, long after these expectations have been disappointed.

In these days comparatively few statements of results are given without at least referring to the value or the cost of the life insurance. This is encouraging, but it does not go far enough.

The fact is that the investment policies of the companies, including even the limited-payment life policies, could be and should be better in-vestment contracts than they are. For in nearly every case it will be found that they are handicapped by an unduly large loading upon the premiums.

This is due to the theory, a very practical theory at that, that the loading, in order to meet the requirements of the agency system, must be proportionate to the net premium, or nearly so, no matter if the net premium has been increased by a large pure investment addition. Managers of life insurance companies who would roundly condemn and even ridicule a pure investment contract, which provided for deducting 20 per cent. from the principal for expenses and at-tempting to earn full returns upon the whole by putting 80 per cent. of it out at interest, will add