EUROPE'S RICHEST STATE.

Press, Volume L, Issue 14916, 14 March 1914, Page 8

EUROPE'S RICHEST STATE.

A CLAIM FOR GERMANY,

SOME STARTLING FIGURES

(FROM A CORRESPONDENT.)

BERLIN, February 3

Germany is Europe's richest Stato. Sho easily beats France both in total wealth and total income; and sho heats England too. In the whole world she is exceeded for income and wealth by the United States only. People brought up on tho notion of "poor Germany" now rub their eyes, but Germany's march to material pre-eminence is entirely of recent date ; the whole process has taken placo in the twenty-five years of the Kaiser's reign. During tho Kaiser's jubilee last summer this theme was dealt with in numberless anniversary books. It was put forward also in a commemorative work issued on the fortieth anniversary of its foundation by tho great Dresdner Bank. Now it is dealt with by Professor Dr. Carl Helfferich. an unchallenged authority, who emphatically proclaims that France and England, until lately Europe's two richest States, are far behind Germany in all that makes for material prosperity.

Dr. Carl Helfferich is one of the new Germany's most interesting personalities. He is known to the public mostly as director of the Deutsche Bank" as a prominent member of the anti-agrarian Hansa League, as one of the scientific mult'-milliouaires who make Germany at once rich and learned. He is. however, more than this. He is a professor; he has helped to negotiate international treaties and has a diplomatic title; he is a traveller; is a friend of Kaiser Wilhelm; and. finally, he writes big books as easily as he writes big cheques. , Helfferich's most startling argument is that Germany is richer than England in total income and total capital wealth. Most statisticians believed until lately that Germany's bigger working population gave her a'bigger-national income than France's, but that France was ahead in accumulated wealth, and that England was ahead of Germany both in income and wealth. This Helfferich attempts to disprove. He tries to show that Germany is far ahead of France in national wealth as well as in income, and that she is also, though less markedly, ahead of England in both domains. . Germany, says Helfferich, owes tins to her more rapidly increasing population, taken with a much higher average income than obtained when Kaiser Wilhelm came to the throne. In Germany income is fairly easy to-coinpu-tate, because the German States levy income tax on even small incomes. As a rule the limit of exemption is £36. The proportion of Germans exempted dwindles rapidly. In 188G two out oi three heads of families had smaller incomes than £30. Fifteen years later the proportion had fallen to two-fifths. With a" bigger population, the number of exempted persons fell from 21,000.000 to 16,000,000, and the number who paid rose from 10,000.000 to 21,000,000. In the former year the national income of Germany was £'t,O--0.000,0C0. In 1911 it had grown to £2.000,000,000. This rise in the total national income wns due only in part to the quick increase of nopulation. It was due also to greater individual prosperity. Helfferich shows that iv fifteen years the income of the average German rose by ">0 per cent. A German's average income, counting men, women, and children, is, £30. This is a large sum for Europe. In France, which counts as a rich country, the average income is only £25 12s. England is still ahead of Germany in average individual income, but Germany's much bigger population leaves England, as well as France, behind in total income. Against Germany's total of £12,000.000,000 stands a French national income of £o,7r)0,0C0.000. and an English national income of about the sump amount. This comparison chows Germany- with an income of £250,006,000 more than her chief rivals, and if she liked to pinch her population she could spend every year ah extpa £250.000,000 on armaments without reducing herself to penury. In total capital wenli-h Germany's superiority is still more marked. Germany owes this altogether to her bigger population. In per capita wealth she is still behind France, and, therefore, hehind England. France, after all her trials, remains the European State in which the individual has the largest accumulated wealth. Helfferich, after siftinp the best authorities of the three countries, puts the individual's capital wealth, counting money, investments, and real and personal property at: — France ... ... £296 England 12", to £290 Germany ... ... £225 to £2 to But as Germany has a population which is about 20.000,000 stronger than Great Britain's and about 26.000,000 stronger than France's, her total national wealth exceeds thpirs. Helfferich's estimate, which takes as correct the calculations of the best French and English authorities, works out as follows : —

Germany—Between £14,5(30.000,000 and £i6,ooo,oer).ooo England— Ret»v-0., £11,500,000,000 and £13,000.000X00. France—£ll . So that Germany is worth between £1,400,000,000. ' and £4,500.000,000 more than England, and between £2,900.000.000 and £4,400,000,000 more than France. England and France are here hopelessly behind; and as the'dominant factor in this comparison is not individual wealth but population, England has a small chance of catching up, and France has no chance at all. Their chances arc; all the smaller, because Germany's industrial efficiency is growing at a great speed, and even in domains where the numbers employed are falling off, production is still growing rapidly. This is most marked in agriculture. In England, and elsewhere in Europe, great industrial development is always accompanied by agricultural -decline. In Germany this has not Happened. Year by year more and more working hands abandon the country and the farm, and crowd into town and factory. The proportion of Germans employed in agriculture has fallen off heavily, and there has even been a decline in the absolute number. Less men are tilling the land than formerly. In spite of this, the agricultural production has not only not fallen off, but has gone on increasing nearly as rapidly as has the industrial output. In 1832, 42 per cent, of Germans lived on the land ; in !„.,.. only 28 per cent. In 1885, 8,500.000 lived in towns of over 20.0G0 inh.iou.ants, whereas in 1910, 22.000,000 lived in towns of that size. The r.clunl farming population declined in fifteen years from 19.000,000 to 17.500,000. This smaller farming population was tilling land which, all round, is the worst in Europe. Yet Helfferich shows that Germany has been producing more rye. wheats, oate, barley, potatoes. t>er acre fertile countries like Russia, France,

Austria-Hungary. . Canada, and the United States. * This is result of science, machinery, and improvement. The German farmer shirks no That is shown br the fact that in 1910 Germany srwnt £20.000.000 artificial manures. Tho result is that in Tteen years the rye crop, which is most important, doubled: the wheat crop increased 50 per cent.: and the potato rroo increased 90 per cent. During the Kaiser's reign tbe beet crop doubled, and the sugar won therefrom increased

from 991.000.000 tons to 2,590,000,000 tons. Germany's splendid technical progress is shown by the iact that since IS7G the amount of sugar extracted from a given quantity of beet has increased 100 per cent. Agricultural output has gone on increasing with fewer working hands, and thero has thus been set free a vast number of hands for industrial work. During the Kaiser's reign the coal output has increased 176 per cent., and the value of the coal has increased 422 per cent. The production ofjn'g-iron has grown 341 per cent., and tne value 509 per cent. When Wilhelm IT. ascended the throne Germany produced 1,000,000 tons of potash. Now her production is nearly 9,000.fTD tons. Potash is almost the only natural produ\£ in which Germany is richer than her rivals. But in iron, where sho has no such advantage, she has beaten England; and is now beaten only by tho United States.

Every year Germ.TfT*: income increases' by £50.000.000. This alone would account for a vast increment of capital. But Germany's main cause of superiority is that she does not spend what she earns: and that she invests her savings productively. In this she differs from England, where littlo is saved, and from France, which saves enormously, but hides rTer gold in A ho family stocking, or nuts it in safe "Tit unprofitable foreien loans. The German wav is different. Out of their £2,0C0.000.000 annual income, Germans wml on themselves only £1.2-"0.000.----000. The Empire, the State Governments, and the municipality, take from the remainder about £"350,000.000. The rest is saved. The savings amount every \o:iv to between £-100.000.000 and £5i:0.0Or).0OO. Allowing for an annual i'l'-rpment frn-'i n.n«t investments of C-:-0.0j0.000. He!flench nuts the total anni'.ql savings at £. r >oo 000.000. Nearly al! this m">i| nioii'v foes into o" J "-- which further wealth. Dr. Ki'hn holds that German wealth is so quickl' - . that, in 1925. the n<i+.i'/-,T>i ;<'<-nTie will have r : «°n from *:'><vy\ POO.OOO to £i.oW 000.000. No „»% 0 r St*to enn touch t*>at. ti, 0 ~;,.],f . r Rt.nteß lik» Franc* ami Eng- ,,, *hl. Imve not "ot population : and o-ilv r-ore State. Russia, lias not got the technical efficiency.