AMERICA TO-DAY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24254, 23 March 1940, Page 10

AMERICA TO-DAY

ATTITUDE TO WAR ANTI-GERMAN FEELING BUSINESS AND TAXATION AUCKLANDER'S IMPRESSIONS (Special to Daily Times) AUCKLAND, Mar. 22. Strongly anti-German, the American Deoole temper their favouring of the Allied cause with the sharp criticism that both France and Great Britain still owe the United States large debts from the war of 1914-18, according to Mr Paul Cropper, who recently returned from a business visit to the United States. He found the country was passing through an uncomfortable period of readjustment, with a slackening of business, except munitions, and a vast army of unemployed. In the eastern States, Mr Cropper found the people more deeply engrossed in the war than New Zealanders seemed to be upon his return, probably, he thought, because Americans on the Atlantic: coast were closer to the trouble. Similarly, those on the Pacific coast were less aware of what war conditions meant than their fellows across the continent. ... ~;-, Commercial Viewpoint The strong feeling against Hitler and Stalin- in America was fairly general wherever Mr Cropper went, but that did not necessarily mean, he said, that the people were particularly pro-British. Unpaid war debts were largely responsible for the critical appraisement of Great Britain. ■•■; ' ...-..-..

The reason for this was, perhaps, that America was essentially a commercial country—for at least: 100 years the best brains had been devoted to commerce. Hence, a different atmosphere, a different tradition from that of the British. For a time there was a marked rise in business in the United States immediately after the outbreak of war, because traders bought enormous quantities of various commodities in the belief that they would be sold to the belligerents, but were disappointed. Since then business had steadily dwindled and goods bought in large bulk remained to be sold.

Large Incomes Heavily Taxed

"We are going through just the same process as in America," Mr Cropper continued. "American people with property and the comparatively well-to-do are violently anti-Government, but. the majority of the people, are behind it. The maximum rates of taxation are very heavy in America, but lowerrincome groups do not pay as much as they would in New Zealand. Incomes of up to 1000 dollars are exempt from tax. and immediately above that the scale is low." Americans were surprised to hear that Australia was floating a war loan at a comparatively high- rate, of interest. ' They wondered why the Commonwealth Government had not issued Treasury bills at about one-half per cent., or some, purely nominal rate. Many American loans to pay for schemes to provide work for unemployed were raised in that way. .."..:,

As wages increased and hours shortened. Mr Cropper added, the ingenuity of the engineer was taxed all the time to produce newer and better machines to lower costs. The net result was that the United States had a higher aggregate of. workless men than ever.