The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-10-19
ISSUES OF The DAY
The United States Compared
With Nations Which Use
the Silver Standard.
CIVILIZATION AND GOLD
How the Working Man Has
Been Benefited in Thirty
Years by the Cur
reney Movement.
his PAY NEARLY DOUBLED
Actual Figure Has Gone Upward
So Has the Purchasing Power
Of Every Dollar.

states With silver-using countries de-
mands a thorough consideration of the
reasons for this comparison. 1t is insist
ed that the gold standard countries have
crippled themselves and enabled the coun-
tries having silver money standards to
secure an increased share in the trade
of silver-using nations. Not only this,
but It Is asserted that, While gold stand
ard countries have been in q depressed
commercial condition, silver standard
countries have been enjoying Increased
export trade. prosperity in manufacture
ing and Increase of facilities for develop
ing their commerce. And the statements
made do not stop at this. The wages of
those engaged in the industries of silver
countries are said to have increased or
remained where they were. At the same
time, the cost of production having been
reduced, in comparison with goid-using
nations, it is claimed that their manu-
facturers are thus enabled to underseIl
the gold nations in the markets of the
East In fact. the condition of the peo-
pie of the sil-ver-standard countries is
said to have been bettered by the pom
tinuous use of silver, while the remainder
of the world, being on a gold standard, is
made to serve them, and silver-standard
countries have usurped the position of
the western nations In the of
the East. All this is very important.
if true But is it true?
Granting, for the time being, that popu-
lar conditions in countries using silver
have improved, What of it2 Is there a
silver country in existence that Is now
on as high a plane of civilization as is
that generally prevalent in gold coun-
tries? Are not the wage earners, the la
boring population of the gold nations bet
ter cared for. better clothed and fed n
possessed of more comforts than the
workingmen of the silver countries? No
one disputes this.
If the issue between a gold standard or
a silver one is to be settled by a com
working respectively unde one or the
other. preference must be given to the
gold standard. just as certainly as the
conditions of labor are better in the
United States, Great Britain and Germany
thar in Mexico, India and hin
But, in all fairness, we must admit this
betterment of conditions in go~ld-standard
countries Is not so much the -sedue
of the use of a gold standard as of the
general development of what we call civ
ilization, of which the use of a goId-stand-
ard is rather a symptom than a cause.
Other things remaining the same, no one
will claim hat the adoption of a silver
inc by the United States would re-
duce us to barbarism, or that any use of
a gold standard by China would alone
raise her civilization to the level of that
of the United States. But what has been
the experience in both civilized and un-
civilized countries as to the results of
appreciation and depreciation in their
standards?
Naturally In different countries, and
even in h same country at the same
time, the quality of the money has not
always been the same. How has the
the depreciation of the currency made
him better off, or has he been injured?
Theoretically, there can be no question
questions have been raised concerning the
evidence.
UNITED STATES.
The history of the United States prob
ably offers better facilities for tracing the
effect of a currency on the welfare of the
wage Garner than that of any other ma
ton. Statistics here have been more care
fully compiled. More than that. the his
tory of the country has been a continued
experiment with money standards; SO that
the United States, as colonies n a ma
ton, has tested nearly every phase of
the. Money Question
The Civil War and its accompanying
phenomena offer better advantages for
investigation han any other period. 1t
was during this period thai the exigen-
cies of the situation brought about a de-
probation in the quality of the money in
circulation. The first issue of legal-tender
notes caused great uneasineSs, the cur
rency was inflated, the andar depre-
ciated and prices advanced at once.
TNS depreciation was extreme in 1865,
continued for a year longer at a high
rate and then irregularly diminished, dis
eminent resumed specie payments. Cen
orally speaking. 1925, inclusive, was a
period of great and IN the whole increas-
ing depreciation. 1865 a period of irreg-
uiar appreciation. We have thus thor
oughly tried both. Statistics are ample
from which their results can be shown.
What are the conclusions to be drawn
from this experience?
IF we take the average nominal wages
paid to wage earners In the leading oc-
equations in 1860 as an arbitrary normal
100 per cent. for nominai wages: and let
the amount of the leading n-ecessaries of
life that could be purchased in 1860 by
the wages then paid be represented by
an arbitrary 100 per cent. for the ~purchas-
ing power of wages, then by comparing
the average nominal wages paid at any
given period with the price at that period
Of the given amount of necessaries, we
get the purchasing power Of wages at
that time when compared with 1880.
TABLE OF WAGES, PRICES AND PUR-
CHASING POWER IN THE UNITED
STATES. 1S6o-l891.
(Aldrich's Senate Report, Part l.. pp. 10, s3.)
Xxx