| Mid-March, 1922, over July, 1914. | Mid-June, 1922, over July, 1914. |
| 91.4 per cent. | 85.2 per cent. |
and these are the final figures which we recommend the Government to adopt.
Notes on the Compilation.
(a) Comparison of Post Office, Ministry of Labour and Local Government Board Figures.
The close similarity between the figures supplied by the various Departments can perhaps be most clearly seen in a different tabular form.
For every 100 shillings spent by wage-earning classes in July, 1914, the following would be the corresponding amounts (as shown by the different returns) which would have to be spent in order to maintain the same standard of living in March and June, 1922.
Post Office (a) | Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Local Govt. (b) | Mean of columns (a) and (b). (c) | Deviation of (a) and (b) from the mean. | Deviation as a percentage of column (c). | |
| March, 1922 | 195.7 | 187.0 | 191.35 | 4.35 | 2.3 |
| June, 1922 | 187.8 | 182.5 | 185.15 | 2.65 | 1.4 |
The last column shows that in general the difference between Post Office, Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Local Government was 2.3 per cent. of the mean for prices returned for March, 1922, and 1.4 per cent. of the mean for prices returned for June, 1922—surely a small difference considering the instability of prices.
(b) Sundries.
A point of some importance is the following:—