OCR Text |
Show I FUTURE BUSINESS OF i THE WORLD. . , ,Jt, I)1 In a review of the finnnces of the world and the great debt which is upon other nation?, tho Snn Francisco Chronicle says I When Secretary Redfield Bays thai the world owea us 115,000,000,000 net he is very likely within th mark. Should W mnko any attempt to cash In at the present timo we should mrn with very poor success Once fin-in. ( illy il-ly powerful nations arc now asking to be allowed to "fund" even the int. rsi due on their bonds That means that tho American taxpayers must put up I 'fl 4 ,nr eash to pay the Interest as it be comes due and take tho notes of our debtors. And they josiro to become indebted to us to tho tune of some trillions tril-lions In addition. The question is how they arc over to pay us Certainly not in gold, for all the gold in tho world would not nearly pay what they already owe us The in ternational function ot gold is to settle set-tle international trade balances, anfl when they get too big for tho avail I able gold some othir method of payment pay-ment must bo devised And riOte on which not even the interest is paid cannot continue to be accepted iuuofl- i nitely. M ij Europe wants, and must have, cot ton, copper, coal, foodstuffs, lumbor and many minor products of which we have a surplus th;u we wish to sell. What Europe wouli like to do Is to work up our raw materials and sol. us the resulting products, just as stir u ed i., l to do a century ago. But we have i passed out of that &tage of .'ndustnal raw materials for ju.selves and also to produce surpluses to soli abroad. In the aggregate there Is certain to be an aa important movement of manufac- , ' ture both ways, but for a 'on" timo in the future the aggregate trade balance I will be too heavily in our favor to I make gold settlements possible. Li .i There is a way out. There re grea' areas of the world still undeveloped, and also as to some of these areas, not populated. Europe will uell to these areas, In competition with us to bo sure, but she will sell For some timo, at any rate, the European stardard of life, both of rich and poor. wlH bo (ar below ours. That will give those countries coun-tries an advantage in neutral m; rkvts, which wo shall have to fet on with HVI On the other hand, the "invisible" movement will be far less than formerly, for-merly, since we will ship In our own vessels now. do more of our own insurance in-surance and share in the profits of ex change. And per contra alien immigrants immi-grants are likely to send home more per capita than ever before, and when Europe is fully reopened to tourists we shall promptly proceed to make all former American records look l:ke 30 cents Touring Eu.-ope is going to come high, but we will do It. vnd while all this is going on and adjjst-ing adjjst-ing itself we will have to trust Europe . rr fr a lot of money. We cannot Ie down the bars to European manufactures which we can produce. On the contrary, con-trary, they will have to be higher. Bui MJ; jj. in oihei ways we can, and will, help Europe to recover from its deb?uch. |