FINANCIAL CONDITION OF THE CITIES COUNTIES AND TOWNS OF THE UNITED STATES.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 5736, 18 August 1879, Page 3

FINANCIAL CONDITION OF THE CITIES COUNTIES AND TOWNS OF THE UNITED STATES.

A correspondent or the San Francisco Bulletin has telegraphed the : following from Chicago to that journal : The forthcoming number of the Princeton Review will publish some important and interesting figures, compiled by Robert P. Porter, a journalist of this city, regarding the financial condition of the towns, counties, and cities of the United States. In a former article he gave the financial condition of 130 principal cities down to 1876, and the present investigation is brought down to the close of the year 1878, and includes the counties, cities, and towns of the entire country. The figures are as follows : 1870. 1860. Municipal debt of 130 cities $6-14,378,063 $221,312,003 Assessed value of the same 6,176,032,153 3,451,019,331 Annual taxation of the same 112,711,275 64,060,914 Population of same ..! 8,760,240 6,019,914 The percentage of increase is-—Debt, 200 per cent.; taxation, 83 per cent.; valuation, 75 per cent.; and population only 33 per cent. The municipal debt of 130 cities, representing a population of only 8,576,294, exceeds in 1876, by over 128,000, OOOdols., the county, town, and city indebtedness of the entire country in 1870. In six years the indebtedness of these cities had exceeded by over 316,000,000d015. the bonded and floating indebtedness of all the cities and towns in the United States, which, in 1870, according to the census, amounted to 5I5,819,OO0do!s. From eleven States complete returns have been obtained. These States are New York, Massachusetts, Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Kansas, Missouri, Connecticut, Georgia, and Rhode Island; In these the total aggregate local debt in 1878 was 546,285,528d015., and in 1870 it, was 286,179,060d015. The assessed valuation of property in these States was 7,172,148,179d015.in1870,and9,333,696,5!5d015. in 1878. Although bad enough, the second investigation shows a better condition of affairs than did the first. The chief danger lies in the cities, not in counties and towns. The increase in the cities was at the rate of 200 per cent., and by adding in the county and town debt, the increase is less than 100 per cent. Returns from the rest of the States are incomplete, but are as complete and correct as possible to obtain until after the census of 1880 is taken. The total local debt of the country at the close of the year 1878 was 1,051,106,112d015., exclusive of State debts.