GERMANY.

Hokitika Guardian, 27 October 1923, Page 4

GERMANY.

TIIAOE COXDITIOXS. FUTURE PROSPECTS. (Uv Frank 11. Jk-ardmore, late of

Sydney). COLOGNE, Aug. 8. Imagine a country where prices of all commodities have arisen ironi 10 to !0 per cent daily for weeks past; where everything has doubled in price on oat-11 of tlie last three days, with the certainty of similar increases in the immediate future, and the reader will j have some idea of what is happening j Germany to-day. Only Russia has any parallel to happenings hc-ro regarding prices, as no other country has attempted to defray the cost of government with the help of the printing presses. Shops and hanks all have queues during business hours, which are now restricted in the ease of the former to four hours daily. The position of sellers is, that goods are cleared within a few hours of arrival at prices from 100 per cent upward over cost in marks, and cost of replacement is a further 100 to 200 per cent increase. Thus, shops trading according to regulations, which are vorv severe on profiteers, become bankrupt very quickly, dust at present the hn is not respected. Prices rise many times per day, with the dollar quotetion. and, to make matters worse, there lias been for weeks past a shortage of marks. The printing presses work three shifts per day, hut the shortage become- more and more acute. For about otic hour daily, customers arc iatiuned with an issue ol one sterling’s worth daily. Xon-eustomers are denied entry to the banks.

T he popular idea that goods are pur ciia-od for next to nothing is wrong. Restaurant prices, certainly, are low. A meal costing 3s in Sydney can be had here for one-third that sum, hut shop goods, siuTi as clothes, are quite up to l.nndnii prices. A lirst-qunlil y -liver fox fur skin, umrimnied, costs, ln-dav. as much as Cum sterling. A readymade suit of clot lies, of very indifferent German cloth, costs, even to-day, £{. Travelling is cheap. One travels to Hellin from Cologne. lirsl-elnss with sleeper, an 11 hours’ journey, for ahold 2s. The fare was ills three days ago and probably it will he eighteen-pen ’C to-morrow. It is very often cheaper A sleep in a train on a twelve hours journey than in an hotel. A letter Irom here to Sydney costs one-fortieth part of one penny fur postage.

The wonder is how the people stand it. Certainly they have not previously hail an experience of the value of tli" mark depreciating 500 per cent within Ts hours. A large proportion of the town people hold only foreign money. Even shop girls and youths hold noth iug else. If foreign money is not available, and it is only allowable under license to buy such, then clothes are purl based. Xo one holds marks. Jhe mystery is where all the marks go io. Rut, wiial of tlie old people- There will he untold suffering in Germany now, as never licforo experienced. \ doctor’s fee for a German is anything a patient can afford. The poor people pay about one half-penny, on to-day's value. Foreigners must pay the fee in their own currency, at their own country’s fee. A doctor with a purely German clientele would probably earn, today, about I*l per week—perhaps.' The Government has attempted several schemes io stabilise- ihe mark must of them worthy of a child s intoiiigeure. The obvious one. which mir.i he adopted early or late, is to slop printing marks. 'The misery then will iie, at iirst. almost too awful to imagine. Rut it must be fined, like medicine, and with similar after-eliects • —hut. long after. There is little doubt, however, th.u the country is sound. There i- no internal debt due to tlie tall ol themar.t. T lie only external debt is tlie reparation debt, which, if capitalised, would not exceed tliai of Great Britain, per head of population. The value of the mark nut withstanding, Germany is mo -i probahlv the richest and most pro-porous country in F.nr.me. the luturc ibriglit. All buildings and plant of amcnniinereial concern .stand to-day on their hooks at one mark. While they pay some hundreds per cent dividend iu paper marks, they are really iving I'nr the future.

There are some deluded people who believe that the mark will improve permaiicntlv at some tuture date, but tiie, don’t live in Germany. One M a miles - ter merchant recently invested UIO m ten million marks, staling: “Ibis will hn a nice nest-egg for me when f m sixty. ’’ Xo German wishes for an improved mark. When stabilisation comes it must be at a level near rnck-bnl tom. at a level where prices and wages adjust themselves to its value. Any other figure would spoil disaster.