m 
#0 
BSni 
ÎWl 
XVlll 
- 
%- 
and £1 Ils. 6c?. to the municipality ; thus paying 3*4 per cent, of his assessed 
income. A workman with £2 a week would pay £3 17s. 6c?., viz., £l 11s. to 
the State and £2 6s. 6c?. to the municipality, or 3*7 per cent, of his assessed 
income. 
Incomes under £45 a year are exempt from State taxation but may be 
taxed for local purposes at the discretion of the municipality. The Communal 
Taxation Act fixes below this minimum three income groups, to each of which 
a base rate of taxation is assigned. The scale is as follows :—Incomes up to 
£21, two-fifths per cent, of income up to a maximum of Is. 'l\d. ; incomes from 
£21 to £33, 2s. 4\d. ; incomes from £33 to £45 inclusive, 4s. In theory the 
full local additional percentage may be levied upon these base rates, but in 
practice the municipalities either exempt these three grades of income altogether 
or levy a lower percentage upon them. 
In many towns a further percentage of the -State Income Tax is levied by 
the religious communes (parishes), or the municipalities on their behalf, as a 
Church Tax for the upkeep of churches, support of clergy, &c. Each person 
liable to State Income Tax is taxed for this purpose by the religious community 
to which he legally belongs, whether Protestant, Roman Catholic or Jewish, 
and the liability can only be escaped by formal withdrawal from the Church. 
The Church Tax varies with local needs, and in some of the towns investigated 
it is as high as 50 or 60 per cent, of the State Income-Tax. In Berlin it is only 
13^ per cent, and falls only on persons who pay on incomes exceeding £75. 
In most of the other states of the German Empire the methods of local 
taxation are approximately the same as those of Prussia ; but some of the 
Saxon and South German towns retain for local revenue purposes the “ octroi ” 
system, i.e. taxes imposed on a number of articles, chiefly food and beverages, 
brought within the municipal boundaries for consumption there. Such duties, 
which are usually very low in amount, are levied on numerous commodities at 
Dresden, Munich. Nuremberg, Aschaffenburg, and Mülhausen, and at Mannheim 
only on wine and beer (though in this last case there is also a consumption tax 
levied by the State of Baden on meat). 
(ii.)—Food and Food Pkices. 
Budgets of Working-class Families. 
For the purposes of this Enquiry a large number of forms asking for 
particulars as to the weekly income and the expenditure on rent and food 
for one week by a workman and his wife and children living at home, were 
distributed by means of trade unions and other workmen’s societies in the 
various German towns covered in this investigation, and after a certain number 
of returns had been rejected on account of the inadequacy of the information 
given, or for other reasons, 5,046 were left available for statistical purposes. 
The following Table shows the geographical and industrial grouping of the 
Budgets so obtained :— 
Geographical Group. 
Berlin 
Central Germany 
Rhineland-Westphalia 
(a) Textile Towns . 
(&) Hardware Towns 
South-west Germany 
Saxony 
Silesia 
Baltic Ports 
North Sea Ports ... 
Total 
Number of 
Budgets. 
413 
295 
518 
798 
687 
666 
378 
700 
591 
5,046 
Industry. 
Metals and Engineering 
Building ... 
Textiles and Clothing ... 
Woodwork and Furnishing 
Printing and Paper 
Transport and Commerce 
Food, Drink and Tobacco 
Mining and Smelting ... 
Leather 
Glass, Pottery, Stone and Bricks 
Chemicals, Gas, &c. 
Factory Workers 
Workmen undefined 
Other 
Total 
Number of 
Budgets. 
1,142 
1,015 
430 
363 
354 
293 
231 
192 
151 
86 
31 
188 
305 
265 
5,046