HITLER'S INCOME

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 05, Issue 74, 6 July 1942, Page 2

HITLER'S INCOME

| AMONG WORLD'S LARGEST NO BALANCE SHEET Adolf Hitler, violent critic of the plulociat, himself probably draws the world's largest private income. Hi tier is sole owner of Zentral Verlag, the huge eGiman publishing combine which has annual turnover of about .£70,000,000, employs more than 100,000 workers and shows a net profit of between £7,000,000 and £10-MO,OOO. No balance sheets arc ever published; no auditor is ever allowed to examine the books. By terms of a contract arranged between Hitier and the director of the whole structure, Hitler has complete and absolute contrl over the company's income . What he does with the money is a mystery. "It comes to him, not as the Fuehrer, but as the head of a private concern. It is said in many that the Berehtesgaden house and estate are kept up out of this income, but "even the whole paraphernalia of electric lifts and bright-ly-lit tunnels cannot account for more than a small fraction of tlie great sum. Hitler's control began in 1921 when the Zentral Verlag iler N.S.ID.A . P. (National Socialist Party) was registered as a company in the name of Hitler. Development Was Rapid At first its development was slow, but after Hitler took power, it grew quickly by the simple process of confiscating almost all competitors. In 1939 it took over the Jewish concerns of Alossc and Ullstein, two of the largest publishing houses. About the same time, it took over, again by confiscation, the famous Wolff News Agency. Now known as the German News Agency, this service has a complete monopoly in the German news field. - Zentral Verlag owns practically all of the advertising agencies. All the party books and periodicals have also to be published through Zentral Verlag—which means that it gets aH tlie profits, not merely from compulse!y sales of '"Mem Kampf," but from the innumerable and lengthy books by Rosenberg, Goebbels and other Nazi leaders. In a;ldi'i : on, almost all technical and professional periodicals in Germany are printed through the same channel —Hitler's Zentral Verlag. Its greatest business is in the publication of newspapers. It now owns t\vo-»thirds of all Germans newspapers outright, in addition to drawing advertising revenue from 11 of the others. Each daj- more than 16,000.000 newspapers out of the total German circulation of 25,000,000 come from the Zentral Verlag. In come from their sale alone reaches £24,000,000 yearly.