International trade

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1758394757

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-136209

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Taussig, Frank William http://d-nb.info/gnd/120199459

Title:: International trade

Place of publication:: New York, NY

Publisher:: Macmillan

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: XXI, 425 Seiten; graph. Darst.

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Part II. Problems of verification

Collection:: Economics Books

THE FRANCO-GERMAN INDEMNITY OF 1871 269 pleased ? And did specie flow into Germany; or securities; or goods? No certain analysis has been made, or indeed can be made (in view of the inadequate statistical data) of the concrete way in which the indemnity reached the German people, of the processes by which her economic status was affected. These fundamental aspects of the famous transactions have been singularly neglected in the literature of the subject; and it is possible only to piece together fragments of evidence and interpret them as best one can. Tho we have no complete or summary statement from German official sources,! some specific applications of the indemnity funds are known. For two purposes the Government took actual specie — gold. A moderate amount of gold (120 million marks, or 150 million francs) was put in the war chest of the fortress of Spandau. There it was left intact for some forty years; in 1914, when the occasion finally arose to utilize it for military purposes, it proved a bagatelle, negligible for the exigencies of the Great War. It can hardly be said to have served a useful purpose at any time. Far more important, both as regards the amount of physical gold used and as regards the economic effects, was the establishment of the gold standard in Germany. The indemnity payments enabled Germany to get with ease an amount of gold ample for carrying out the transition from the silver standard to the gold. Ordinarily a country which thus remodels its monetary system has a serious financial problem on its hands. It must have in hand large funds, and must usually resort to taxation or loans in order to get them. Germany was spared this embarrassment and strain by the indem- nity. She got the gold easily, and was able to take her time in disposing of the old silver currency which the gold displaced. Apparently something like 750 million francs were applied in this way. For these two accumulations of physical gold, war chest and gold currency, nearly a billion of francs was utilized. The larger part of the indemnity funds still remains unaccounted for; nor is it important for our purpose to account for all, or to fol- ! No full statement — indeed no general statement of any kind — was ever publicly made by the German Government explaining what it did with the indem- nity funds.

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