Cambridge. Economics Tripos Examination Questions, 1923

Eighteen exams constituted the 1923 Economics Tripos at Cambridge University. This post adds them to the collection of transcribed artifacts that constitute the content of Economics in the Rear-view Mirror.

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Links to the 1923 Exams

Part I
English Economic History
Industry and Labour
Economic Theory (Value and Distribution)
Essay on one of seven subjects
Trade and Finance
Recent Economic and General History of Europe
Recent Economic and General History of the British Empire and the United States
Part II
Economic Principles
Public Finance
Subjects for an Essay
Structure and Problems of Modern Industry
Structure and Methods of Government in the Modern World
Distribution and Labour
Political Theory
Money, Credit and Prices
International Law
Economic Conditions in England 1823-1828, and Contemporary Social Thought
The Theory of Statistics

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Earlier and later
Economics Tripos

Links to economics examinations from the Economics Tripos at Cambridge University for other years:

Economics Tripos 1921.
Economics Tripos 1922.

Economics Tripos 1931.
Economics Tripos 1932.
Economics Tripos 1933.

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PART I

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MONDAY, May 28, 1923. 9-12.
ENGLISH ECONOMIC HISTORY.

1. Summarize briefly the agricultural improvements of the 18th century and point out their influence on the enclosure movement.
2. “The essence of the Industrial Revolution is the substitution of competition for the mediaeval regulations which had previously controlled the production and distribution of wealth” (TOYNBEE).
   Examine this statement.
3. “The principles of the Poor Law reform of 1834 were the principles of Elizabethan Statutes.” Discuss.
4. Explain the objects of the Corn Laws and the causes which led to their abolition.
5. Indicate broadly the influence exerted by improved means of transport on the progress of the Industrial Revolution.
6. Consider historically the use of the Income Tax as a means of effecting financial and social reform.
7. What were the causes of the great depression of 1873-96?
8. Show how the economic development of England since 1800 is reflected in the present distribution of her population.
9. What do you consider to have been the principal influences operating during the 19^th century to raise the wages of the very poor?
10. Contrast broadly the character of the economic policy of the State in 1820 with that in the first decade of the present century.
11. Contrast the situation of the agricultural labourer now with his situation one hundred years ago.

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MONDAY, May 28, 1923. 1.30-4.30.
INDUSTRY AND LABOUR.

1. If co-operative societies do not charge higher prices than private traders, where does the so-called “divi” come from?
2. “Trade Unionism has no definite policy in regard to the method of industrial remuneration.” Discuss this statement.
3. How do you account for the comparative slowness of the development of a Trust movement in British industry?
4. In what ways can the State most effectively take action to secure industrial peace?
5. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the joint-stock system of business organization.
6. Give an account of the difficulties of preparing an index number of the cost of living to the working classes.
7.  “…Wage rates at any moment and in every part of the industrial field can be so adjusted to the demand for labour of various grades, that no unemployment whatever can exist. In other words … unemployment is wholly caused by maladjustment between wage-rates and demand.”
   Comment upon this theory of unemployment.
8. What do you understand by “sweating”? Indicate the conditions and the types of industrial organization which are most likely to lead to sweating.
9. Give an account of the main features of the German Cartel system, and compare the Cartels with the American trusts.
10. If the private control of business is to disappear, what form of business management, do you consider, can most effectively take its place?
11. “The worst effects of unemployment, privation and physical deterioration, have been prevented” (The THIRD WINTER OF UNEMPLOYMENT).
    “Many of the unemployed are now suffering the progressive deterioration which inevitably attaches to the condition of being maintained without work” (ANNUAL REPORT OF MINISTRY OF HEALTH).
    Examine these two statements bearing upon the present unemployment situation.

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TUESDAY, May 29, 1923. 9-12.
ECONOMIC THEORY
(VALUE AND DISTRIBUTION).

1. Critically examine the argument that inasmuch as the instruments of production were made by Labour their earnings should go to Labour.
2. On what grounds are economists justified in making any distinction between the rent of land and (a) the return to exceptional natural ability, (b) the return to acquired skill?
3. Examine the view that fluctuations of credit are inevitable in an industrial system based on private enterprise.
4. “In business generally, good luck and bad luck about balance one another; so that the existence of business risks does not affect costs of production.” Examine this statement.
5. Trace the effects on the remuneration of the various agents of production engaged in any industry as the demand for the products of the industry sinks gradually to zero.
6. Which do you consider most threatening to the interests of unorganized labour: the monopolistic power of associations of workpeople or that of associations of employers?
7. What do you understand by the Supply of Labour; do you consider that economic influences play any important part in its regulation?
8. Examine the view that the greater the proportion of supplementary to prime costs in any industry the more fluctuating will be the value of its products.
9. “Economists concern themselves with imperfections in the manner in which production is adjusted to demands; they would be better employed in considering imperfections in the manner in which market demands express real needs.” Consider the importance of this criticism.
10. On the supposition that one motor van employing two men does the same work as two horse vans together employing four men, examine the probable effects on the general level of wages of the substitution of the one for the other.
11. “Every producer, whether entrepreneur, capitalist or workman, in effect sells his services to society for what they are worth; none therefore can draw from society any greater value than he contributes.” With what limitations would you accept this statement?
12. “Monopolistic price policy ranges between two limits. At the one extreme it yields results which are more, at the other extreme it yields results which are less, beneficial to the community than would obtain under a régime of free competition.” Elucidate this statement.

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TUESDAY, May 29, 1923. 1.30-4.30.

Write an essay on one of the following subjects:

1. The educational value of economic studies.
2. The coming economic age.
3. Finance, as an engine of social reform.
4. Economic competition among nations.
5. The decline of agriculture in Great Britain.
6. Principles of settlement — Vienna and Versailles.
7. Incentive in industry.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 9-12.
TRADE AND FINANCE.

1. Before the war the price of gold was fixed at £3. 17s. 10½d. per oz.; now the price varies from day to day. Explain the reasons for this.
2. Assume that a Capital Levy is successfully introduced reducing War Loan interest by £150 m. per annum, and that rates of Income Tax are reduced so as to diminish their total yield by a like sum. What would be the chief economic effects of these changes?
3. To what extent can the Bank of England now control inflation and deflation by means of its discount policy?
4. Consider the probable effects of a tax on sales, e. a tax on turnover, in this country.
5. What are the principal factors now governing the London-New York exchange?
6. Given that England is an exporter of machinery, consider the probable effects on this country of the development abroad of a large and efficient exporting engineering industry.
7. Consider the proposal to meet the cost of a municipal tramway service by a local rate instead of by the collection of fares.
8. Given a surplus of £50m. of State revenue over State expenditure, contrast the effects of employing this surplus (a) in reduction of debt, (b) in reduction of taxation.
9. Discuss the problems arising from the present great accumulation of gold in the United States.
10. “Whether speculation is good or bad depends partly on the speculator, partly on the conditions in which he operates.” Discuss.
11. Consider the difficulties of stabilizing the value of the dollar.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 1.30-4.30.
RECENT ECONOMIC AND GENERAL HISTORY OF EUROPE.

1. “After Trafalgar the war between England and France was to a great extent waged with economic weapons.” Explain the methods and results of this economic struggle.
2. What measures were taken by the Congress of Vienna to restore a balance of power in Europe?
3. “Until the middle of the nineteenth century the economic development of Germany was retarded by both political and economic circumstances.” Illustrate this statement.
4. Discuss the results of the French Revolution of 1830.
5. Explain the failure of the revolutionary movement of 1848-9 in Italy.
6. Do you consider that Austro-Prussian rivalry was the chief obstacle to German unity in the period 1815-1866?
7. In what sense were the years about 1860 a turning point in the agrarian history of modern France?
8. “The foreign policy of Napoleon III recoiled upon himself.” Is this the explanation of his downfall?
9. Explain the part played by the State in the industrial expansion of modern Germany.
10. Compare either the tariff policy or the colonial policy of Germany and France during the period 1871-1914.
11. “The great war followed inevitably when Germany abandoned the traditions of Bismarck’s foreign policy.” Examine this view.

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THURSDAY, May 31, 1923. 9-12.
RECENT ECONOMIC AND GENERAL HISTORY OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE AND THE UNITED STATES.

1. “In the early history of both Canada and Australia serious problems were created by the land policy of the government.” Explain and compare these problems.
2. Compare the position held by the East India Company in India in the years 1783 and 1856.
3. What were the causes of the break up of South Africa into a group of States in the years 1836 to 1854?
4. Illustrate the influence of the United States on the economic and political development of Canada.
5. Compare the difficulties that had to be faced in the federation of the Australian and South African colonies.
6. What are the causes of famines in India and what measures have been taken to mitigate their severity?
7. “The making of the constitution was both a more difficult and a more important matter for the United States than winning the war of independence.” Discuss this view.
8. Explain the reasons why in the United States the Northern and Southern States came to hold different views on the question of slavery.
9. Discuss the influence of the Civil War on the financial and commercial policy of the United States.
10. To what principal causes do you attribute the great industrial expansion of the United States since 1880?
11. In what ways has the settlement of the Pacific Coast influenced the foreign policy of the United States?

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PART II

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MONDAY, May 28, 1923. 9-12.
ECONOMIC PRINCIPLES.

1. “The whole of economic theory is built on the assumption that people always consciously seek their own greatest pleasure: and now that this assumption is discredited, economic theory is in ruins.” Comment.
2. Examine fully the conditions under which a nation can impose a large part of the burden of a general import tariff on foreigners, and discuss whether, these conditions have any practical importance.
3. Discuss the theoretical validity, and the practical consequences, of drawing a distinction between an element of cost and an element of surplus in the payments made to the factors of production other than land.
4. How far does the theory that each factor of production is rewarded according to its marginal productivity appear to you to be applicable to the profits of business enterprise? Would you make any distinction in this respect between the profits of ordinary trade and manufacture and those of speculation in stocks or produce?
5. In what sense does competitive price tend to equal “marginal” costs and in what sense does it tend to equal “average” costs of production? Explain the bearing of your answer on the problem of fixing the price of a nationalised coal supply.
6. Explain carefully the connection between the phenomena of increasing return, joint supply and price-discrimination.
7. In what circumstances, if any, is it justifiable for particular groups of producers (e.g. rubber-growing companies, building trade operatives) to take concerted measures to restrict output?
8. “That able but wrong-headed man, David Ricardo, shunted the car of economic science on to a wrong line, on which it was further urged towards confusion by his equally able and wrong-headed admirer John Stuart Mill.” Explain and comment on this judgment of Jevons.
9. Trace the probable economic effects of providing free and universal travelling facilities within Great Britain and paying for them out of general taxation.
10. A is the only seller and B the only buyer of a certain commodity. At what point will the price of the commodity tend to settle?

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MONDAY, May 28, 1923. 1½-1½.
PUBLIC FINANCE.

1. From what sources can government draw the real revenue required to meet an exceptional and temporary emergency such as a war?
2. What are the principal factors which determine over a period of years (a) the maximum revenue which a government can raise by taxation for expenditure at home, (b) the maximum amount which it can pay as a tribute to foreign governments?
3. What truth, if any, is there in the maxim that “an old tax is no tax”?
4. “An income tax differentiates against saving by striking savings both when they are made and when they yield their fruit.”
   An income tax imposes the same burden on income applied to the saving-use as on income applied to the spending-use: hence those who say that it discriminates against saving really mean that it does not discriminate in favour of saving.
   Which of these opinions do you accept? and why?
5. A government has decided to spend a large sum upon an undertaking which will be completed in three years and will therefore probably yield a net annual revenue equal to the interest (at the rate now current) upon its cost. By what economic considerations should it be guided in deciding whether to raise the sum by a loan or by taxation?
6. A surplus of revenue over expenditure may be used either to pay off part of the national debt or to reduce taxation. In the present circumstances of this country, which course would be more favourable to the economic welfare of the people?
7. Compare the following three methods of assisting an “infant industry” in respect of (a) their effectiveness, (b) the cost which they impose upon the community adopting them: (1) an embargo on competing imports, (2) a protective import duty, (3) a bounty on home production.
8. Discuss the probable economic consequences of exempting from local rates for a period of fifteen or twenty years all working-class houses built in this country within the next three years.
9. Assuming that a service performed by a local authority is to be aided by a grant from the central exchequer, how far should the amount of the grant depend on (a) the amount and quality of the service rendered, (b) the expenditure of the local authority on the service, (c) the wealth of the locality?
10. Compare the effects of raising revenue by inflating the currency with those of a general tax on expenditure.

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TUESDAY, May 29, 1923. 9-12.
SUBJECTS FOR AN ESSAY.

1. Broadcasting
2. Economic Justice.
3. “If indeed all the high talent of the country could be drawn into the service of the government, a proposal tending to that result might well inspire uneasiness.”
4. Prison and the Prisoner.
5. “Whither France? Whither Europe?”
6. International Labour Legislation.

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TUESDAY, May 29, 1923. 1½-4½.
STRUCTURE AND PROBLEMS
OF MODERN INDUSTRY.

1. To what causes do you attribute the present depressed condition of British agriculture? Can you suggest any measures which would promote a revival of this industry without inflicting an economic loss on the community as a whole?
2. Explain shortly the nature and objects of the system of “deferred rebates” employed by shipping rings. Consider the arguments for and against its legal prohibition.
3. Describe and account for the form which industrial combination has taken in modern Germany.
4. In what way and to what extent does an organized produce exchange (a) bear and (b) eliminate the risks of productive industry? Does the Stock Exchange do either?
5. Classify the principal risks against which insurance is taken out in this country, indicating in each case the type of agency through which insurance is usually effected. Are there any branches of insurance in which a greater measure of State control would promote the economic welfare of the people? Give reasons for your opinion.
6. Illustrate from the experience of this and other countries the difficulties encountered by self-governing associations of manual workers seeking to undertake business on their own account. In what types of undertaking are these difficulties least serious and by what means can they be reduced?
7. “Capital and labour have lost the power they once had to attract raw materials; these now attract labour and capital.” Examine this statement in relation to the localisation of industry in the modern world.
8. Distinguish the various methods by which a nationalised industry might obtain new capital and consider their comparative advantages and disadvantages.
9. Examine the part played by the wholesale merchant in aggravating or mitigating the cyclical fluctuation of trade.

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TUESDAY, May 29, 1923. 1½-4½.
STRUCTURE AND METHODS OF GOVERNMENT IN THE MODERN WORLD.

1. “It is the special weakness of the American Federation that in a community distinguished above all others for enormous aggregations of capital the machinery for giving effect to the ideal of social justice is less effectual than it is in any other highly-civilized State.” Explain the meaning of this judgment and discuss its truth.
2. Contrast and account for the part played by political parties in the British and American systems of government.
3. “Second chambers are the political failure of the British Empire.” Discuss this statement.
4. Compare and contrast the methods by which the control of the legislature over either foreign policy or public finance is secured in London, Washington and Paris.
5. “The parts assigned to the President and to the electorate in the new German constitution are wholly incompatible with the Cabinet system of government.” Discuss this statement.
6. Compare the part played by the permanent official in the English system of central and local administration with that played by him in either France or Germany.
7. Explain the different uses made of committees in modern legislatures and discuss their value.
8. What attempts have been made of recent years to improve methods of election to representative bodies, and how far have they proved successful?
9. “The policy of His Majesty’s Government is that of… the gradual development of self-governing institutions with a view to the progressive realization of responsible government in India as an integral part of the British Empire.” Explain briefly how far this development has proceeded.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 9-12.
DISTRIBUTION AND LABOUR.

1. How far would you consider the following phenomena as evidence that the distribution of income was becoming less unequal, (a) an increase in the number of moderate incomes relatively to the number of large incomes, (b) an increase in the number of estates subject to death duties relatively to the total number of the population?
2. “If the demand for labour in general were distinctly less elastic than is commonly supposed, a number of commonly accepted doctrines would be exploded.” Discuss this statement and give illustrations of the doctrines referred to.
3. Under what conditions is it economically advantageous to employers to work their machinery continuously by means of multiple shifts? Consider the effects of a more widespread adoption of this method of working and the reasons why it is not, in fact, more widely adopted.
4. In what respects does a Whitley Council differ from a Trade Board? Estimate the utility of these two institutions and their probable future.
5. “Unemployment insurance by industry is attractive in theory, but unworkable in practice.” Comment on this view.
6. “The payment of different district rates for the same class of work leads to an uneconomic distribution of labour and capital between different districts and is, therefore, economically unsound.” Discuss this statement.
7. “Men work harder after a fall in wages and less hard after a rise.” “A rise in wages is commonly followed by an increase in the efficiency of labour.” How far can these two statements be reconciled (a) with each other, (b) with the facts?
8. Give some account of existing arrangements for conciliation and arbitration in British trade disputes. In what respects, if any, do you think that we should copy more closely the arrangements of other countries?
9. Indicate the chief problems of organisation confronting the British Trade Union movement at the present time.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 9-12.
POLITICAL THEORY.

1. “It is a distinctive trait of medieval doctrine that within every human group it decisively recognises an aboriginal and active Right of the group taken as a whole.” Explain this statement, and show its connection with medieval theories of representation.
2. If Hobbes’ theory of sovereignty is to-day one of the commonplaces of jurisprudence. ethically and politically we occupy ourselves with erecting about it a system of limitations each one of which is in some sort due to Locke’s perception.”
3. “Rousseau’s doctrine of the General Will is merely a specious pretext for the coercion of minorities.
4. “Natural rights are real things, arising from real and permanent facts in our psychology.”
5. Within what limits do you consider that a government is justified in promoting or discouraging the creation and dissemination of opinion?
6. What principles should, in your opinion, direct the action of a government in the case of a trade dispute? To what extent, if at all, do these principles require modification where the State, as employer, is party to the dispute?
7. Examine the implications of the formula “Equality of opportunity,” and discuss its merits as a guide in legislation.
8. “It is neither possible nor desirable that judges, in administering the law, should be unaffected by current political and social ideas.”
9. “Liberty, as a principle, has no application to any state of things anterior to a time when mankind have become capable of being improved by tree and equal discussion. Until then there is nothing for them but implicit obedience to an Akbar or a Charlemagne if they are so fortunate as to find one.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 1½-4½.
MONEY, CREDIT AND PRICES.

1. Explain and illustrate the influence exercised on the general level of prices by changes in the velocity of circulation of bank deposits.
2. Give an account of the mechanism of dealing in forward exchange, and the forces determining the difference between the spot and forward prices of foreign currencies.
3. Compare and contrast the banking systems of Great Britain, the United States, and any one other country.
4. Describe any two index numbers of prices in actual use, and indicate any respects in which it seems to you that they could be improved upon.
5. Discuss the advisability of immediately abolishing the restrictions on the export of gold from this country in the event of the dollar exchange reaching the pre-war parity.
6. “The experience of Germany suggests that movements in the exchanges are usually the cause and not the result of changes in the level of prices.” Comment.
7. Investigate the reasons for which the general level of prices may be permanently higher in one gold standard country than in another.
8. Discuss the issues raised by the proposal to nationalise the banking system of Great Britain.
9. Give an account of the gold exchange standard, with special reference (a) to its working in India before the war, (b) to its suitability as a solution of European currency problems.

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WEDNESDAY, May 30, 1923. 1.30-4.30.
INTERNATIONAL LAW.

1. Discuss the legality of the German submarine campaign during the late war, and whether it suggests any conclusions as to the advisability of drawing up a new code of rules for the future conduct of war at sea.
2. Suppose Greece made an unprovoked military attack on Bulgaria to-morrow, in what way would the application of the principles of neutrality by other countries differ either from the application which they would have had in June 1914 or from the application which they were given during the Greco-Turkish conflict in 1921 and 1922? Explain the differences.
3. Discuss the legality of large-scale air-bombardments directed against cities such as London, Paris or Berlin.
4. What is the mechanism provided in the various Treaties of Protection to racial, religious and linguistic Minorities, or established by the League of Nations, for dealing with complaints that the rights of these minorities have not been observed?
   Discuss its efficacy in the light of other proposals put forward and of the history of the protection of racial, religious and linguistic minorities during the 19th century and during the last three years.
5. “An unprovoked declaration of war is at once the most immoral and the most legal of all crimes.” Discuss this statement.
6. In what respects does the Permanent Court of International Justice differ from the Permanent Court of Arbitration? In what respects is it an improvement, and in what ways is it likely to improve the general system of international law?
7. Discuss shortly any three of the following:
   1. The Venezuela Boundary dispute.
   2. The Newfoundland Fisheries dispute.
   3. The Anglo-French dispute concerning the Conscription Laws in Tunis.
   4. The pending dispute between Germany and the Allied Powers concerning transit through the Kiel Canal.
   5. The “Optional Protocol” attached to the Statute of the Permanent Court of International Justice.
8. Discuss the proposals which have been made to summon an international conference for the codification of international law, and the relation of these proposals to the question of the obligatory jurisdiction of the Permanent Court of International Justice.
9. Consider whether the application given to the principle of the Open Door in the A, B, and C Mandates respectively is in strict accordance with the principles laid down in Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations.
10. Compare the methods adopted for drawing up and bringing into force general international conventions before and since the establishment of the League of Nations, and their results.

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THURSDAY, May 31, 1923. 9-12.
ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN ENGLAND 1823-1828, AND CONTEMPORARY SOCIAL THOUGHT.

1. Indicate some of the pitfalls which must be avoided, if an impartial survey of economic conditions is to be derived from the Reports and Evidence of contemporary Parliamentary Papers.
2. What evidence, if any, is there that the distress of the Hand-loom Weavers was caused by the introduction of machinery?
3. Illustrate from Huskisson’s Speeches the closeness of the affinity between him and Adam Smith.
4. What justification is there for calling the early English Socialists “the Ricardian Socialists”?
5. “Co-operation seeks to put the working classes in that situation where they shall enjoy the produce of their labour, instead of that small part called wages.” (Extract from Address of Robert Owen, Chairman of the First Co-operative Congress.) Show the connection between the purpose of co-operation as thus defined and the future development of the Co-operative Movement in Great Britain.
6. From what angles did the Emigration Committees of 1826 and 1827 approach their problem; and how far did their recommendations meet the problem which they set out to solve?
7. How far was Cobbett correct in his view of the reactions of urban growth on rural industries?
8. Explain exactly the difference between the Combination Acts of 1824 and 1825. On what grounds did the Government defend the modifications introduced by the Act of 1825?
9. “The real wages of the labourer in a redundant population are no more than according to the habits of the country will enable him to subsist and propagate his race, and he must have the same real wages and will have no more, while the population is redundant, whether the taxes remain or are all repealed.” (PLACE, Diary, 12 Oct. 1826.)
   How far is this a legitimate deduction from the teaching of the Classical Economists?

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THURSDAY, May 31, 1923. 9-12.
THE THEORY OF STATISTICS.

1. Explain what is meant by two attributes being “associated”; give more than one test of association, and prove the principal properties of the fourfold table (association table).
2. “In selecting an index-number formula the purpose to which it is put is immaterial.” Discuss this.
3. Explain the uses of a measure of dispersion, define the principal measures and briefly discuss their relative advantages.
   Find the mean and standard-deviation of the following distribution.

Marks	Candidates
10—19	2
20—29	5
30—39	10
40—49	23
50—59	34
60—69	22
70—79	3
80—89	1
Total	100

4. State the product-sum formula for the correlation coefficient, deduce its principal properties and describe the form of the arithmetic when calculating the coefficient for a grouped correlation table.
   The coefficient of correlation between age at death of father and age at death of son is found to be 0.14: for a character determined solely by hereditary constitution it is estimated that the correlation should be 0.5. Supposing that N deaths can be sorted into two distinct classes, in pN of which the age is determined solely by hereditary constitution, and in (1 – p)N of which the age is purely a matter of chance, find the value of p required to reduce the correlation from 0.5 to 0.14.
5. If w₀, w₁, w₂, are the numbers living in three successive ten-year age-groups; u₀, u₁, u₂, u₃, u₄, u₅ the numbers in the corresponding five-year age-groups, so that

w₀ = u₀ + u₁,   w₁ = u₂ + u₃,   w₂ = u₄+ u₅

show, using Newton’s formula of interpolation, that we may take approximately

u₂ = (1/2) w₁ + (1/16)( w₀ –  w₂ ).

6. What is meant by “standardising” a birth-rate or death-rate? Discuss the possible methods of standardising birth-rates, and their difficulties.
7. Find the standard error of sampling of (a) the arithmetic mean, (b) the median, and show for what forms of frequency distribution the median will be relatively more stable than the mean.
8. Explain the problem to be solved in constructing a life-table and the meaning of the columns usually headed l_x, p_x, q_x, d_x, and m_x, giving the principal relations between these quantities.
   Supposing that you already possessed tables showing, for a series of districts, the death-rates for quinquennial age-groups 0-5, 5-10, 10-15, etc., discuss how far the construction of the corresponding life-tables would tend to throw any further light on the differences between them.
9. Describe and discuss the methods used for investigating, with the aid of the coefficient of correlation, the relations between two quantities varying with the time.

Source: Cambridge University. Economics Tripos Papers, 1921-1926. With the papers set in the Qualifying examinations 1925 & 1926. Cambridge at the University Press 1927, pp. 40-58.

Image Source: Kings College, Cambridge England. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C. 20540.