Geld-, Bank- und Börsenwesen

Cost of living in German towns

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1012150852

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-27269

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Obst, Georg http://d-nb.info/gnd/11759296X

Title:: Geld-, Bank- und Börsenwesen

Edition:: 25., verbesserte Auflage

Place of publication:: Stuttgart

Publisher:: C.E. Poeschel Verlag

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (XV, 521 Seiten)

Digitisation:: 2018

Collection:: Business and Management Classics

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Dritter Teil. Börse und Börsengeschäfte

Collection:: Business and Management Classics

328 MANNHEIM. The following Table gives the birth and death rates and the infantile mortality rate for a period of five years :— Year. Birth-rate per 1,000 of Population. Death-rate per 1,000 of Population. Infantile Mortality per 1,000 Births. 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 43 9 42 6 414 403 38 7 23'2 20-1 213 20 6 19-0 248 230 238 238 218 It is a peculiarity of the older part of the town that its streets are laid out in regular squares, so that they present the appearance of a chess-board. These squares (Quadrate) bear the letters of the alphabet from A to U, and the houses in each block are numbered from 1 forward round the four sides. Thus a stranger wishful to make a call is directed to A.8, L.20, or U.35, as the case may be. The arrangement suggests a modern origin, yet it has been in vogue for 200 years, and there is no disposition to abandon it. When the co-ordination of the squares has been learned there is no difficulty in finding one’s way about the town, and the street directory is superfluous within the area of the squares, for, though many small “ cross-streets ” ( Querstrassen) intersect the main thoroughfares, these, too, are numbered. The blocks are of unequal frontage, varying from 90 to 180 feet. Outside the old town the streets are named in the conventional way, yet even there the block system of building is followed. It is in the original area of squares that the oldest and worst property is found and the congestion of population is greatest. Many of the buildings in the by-streets are let off as workshops and warehouses. Brick is the usual building material ; but sandstone, with granite for the lower courses, is often used for buildings of a better class. During the past generation the economic life of the town has undergone a striking change. More and more Mannheim has ceased to be a trading town, and industry is now pre-eminent. The transformation has largely altered the character of the population. When industry placed its impress more distinctly on the town, workpeople were drawn to it from all parts of the Empire by abundant facilities for employment at wages higher than could be earned in less progressive places. There was a great influx in the years 1885-1890, bringing over 13,000 strangers to the town, over and above the loss by removals, with the result that for every 100 additions to the population by excess of births over deaths 276 resulted from immigration. Mannheim’s importance as a trading centre for corn, timber, petroleum, tobacco, coal, and colonial produce, which come and go by water and rail, continues unimpaired, but it is now the home of many and important industries as well. Though situated on the other side of the river in Bavarian territory, the extensive works of the Baden Aniline and Soda Company, employing 7,000 workpeople in 480 factory buildings, belong by origin to Mannheim, though Mannheim now only receives their ill-odours and the smoke of their fifty chimneys when the wind is in a particular direction. There are many large engineering works, one with 3,000 workmen, at which machinery in great variety is produced ; there are gas motor and motor car works, cable works, rubber and celluloid factories, paper and paper-pulp factories, large plate-glass works, a jute spinning factory ; and on both banks of the river are corn mills, oil factories, and extensive timber-yards, which supply many saw-mills with their raw material. On every side of the town are evidences of industrial expansion. The road to Rheinau is lined for several miles with factories and workshops, while the incorporated Waldhof district across the Neckar is being developed entirely on industrial lines. How susceptible Mannheim is to the fluctuations of industry and trade is illustrated by the percentage of empty dwellings at various times. In 1900, when the last wave of prosperity was at its highest, only 1'40 per cent, of the dwellings were vacant ; in 1901 the percentage was 5T2, in 1902, 6*76, in 1903, 6*61, and since then there has been a fall to 4*24 per cent, in 1904, 2 71 in 1905,. and 107 in November, 1906. In the years of high percentage the great majority of the empty dwellings were such as are tenanted by the working classes.

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