This chapter summons new evidence to examine a half-century old claim: that the English friendly societies were mortally ill by the turn of the twentieth century, when the first state pension schemes were introduced. Since Gilbert's 1965 paper, it has been widely held that the insolvency of the friendly societies towards the end of the Victorian period dampened their opposition to state pension schemes and inspired support for such schemes within some societies. In Gilbert's argument, the friendly societies faced two problems as the nineteenth century wore on. First, intense competition between societies for new recruits made increases in required contributions or reduction of benefits infeasible. Second, dramatic increases in life expectancy led to a gradual aging of many society memberships, and with that, greater liabilities. As Gilbert points out, these two problems fed off each other. As societies became more and more burdened by sick payments, they required more new recruits. But in seeking new recruits, they not only faced competition from other societies, but also a ‘growing reluctance of men in early life to join societies at all’. Key to this reluctance, Gilbert argues, was a widespread fear among youths that the societies were financially unsound, and thus would be unable to compensate them in their old age.

This argument, though drawing from demographic realities of the period, is puzzling, for it treats the friendly societies as static, inadaptable institutions.