The montepío in the Indies: a contributory survivors' pension carried to America, 1761-1786

Spain built a survivors' pension fund for the widows and orphaned daughters of its officers and officials, paid for by a standing deduction from serving salaries, and extended it across the Atlantic with a declaration for America in 1773 and quarterly returns of the deductions from every accounting office in the viceroyalty. The price of the pension was written into the same rules: an officer needed royal licence to marry, and a widow who remarried kept half.