Page:Walter Renton Ingalls - Wealth and Income of the American People (1924).pdf/228

206 holders there are data in the form of estimates by Professor Friday and Doctor Knauth and the reports of the Bureau of Internal Revenue showing dividends actually received, according to the income tax returns. These figures, together with those for the national income are tabulated as follows:

There are obvious discrepancies in these figures. There is no doubt that in 1916 and 1917 people did not report incomes as carefully as in 1918 and 1919. We must allow for a considerable amount of understatement of income in those years, especially in the two to five thousand dollar class of income receivers. On the other hand Doctor Knauth thinks that he may be too high for those years. In any case, even granting that the Bureau of Internal Revenue’s figures are too low for 1916-1917 there is no doubt that Friday’s figures are too high in every case. Perhaps a mean between Knauth’s and the Revenue Bureau’s figures may be nearly correct.

In making comparisons, the dividends of each year probably should be set against the income of the previous year, for no increase in the rate of distribution would be made until after the income had been realized. Thus, 1916 was notoriously the greatest year of corporate profits. The great increase in dividend distribution occurred naturally in 1917. But the surprising