Los Angeles herald., 1908-04-08
OF WORLDWIDE. INTEREST
ERENzHED FINANCE IN JAPAN
sy FREDERIC J. HAskiN

couraged. They bought the Japanese
yarns at fancy prices and the spinners
thereupon allowed their stable business
in China to go by default. Now the
East Indian yarns have supplanted the
Japanese yarns In the Chinese market,
the home market Is dead and the jap
anese spinners are making yarn. to store
in their godowns. The dividends have
exhausted the treasury and ruin is inn
minent.
Frenzied finance has some queer
kinks In 1t in this part of the world.
The Japanese business men seem to
get at things from different angle as
they look on the world from their obli-
que eyes. The cotton spinners had
meeting and discussed the loss of the
foreign. business. Now, 1t has been the
fashion in Japan to bolster up by
subsidy and business teo weak to stand
alone. Japanese ships are subsidized,
some of them profitably SO. These peo-
pie have seized on the idea of a sub
sidy as a cure for every commercial Ill
and the subsidized concerns are legion
So the cotton spinners decided to tax
themselves for a private subsidy in
order to give bounty on every pound
of yarn shipped to q foreign market!
This would, they said, permit them to
sell below the market price. But this
was taking the thing too far and the
scheme did not hsld together long One
native newspaper said 1t was case OF
cutting the flesh of the thigh in order
to eat" and that view appealed TO the
sspinners when they were called on to
pay their share Of q bounty to be given
to some other spinner to reward him
for cutting down the price of their own
product.
The spinning mills will have to close
10 nnndiffnnq not riVht6d at
once. silk reeling establishments are
already closing and the silk production
probably will be curtailed next year.
Thus far the vast amount of public
work going on has kept the most of the
people in employment, but as the people
pay the bills through taxes this is an
ether case of cutting the flesh of the
thigh to eat It may help for a time,
but the day .of reckoning will come.
Among the masses OF the people the
prosperity caused by the unusual dis
tribution of money during the war is
still manifest This is a point to be
considered in reckoning Japan's fight
ing spirit. The nation has million
men who would welcome war that
they might flock into the army--not be-
cause of the old samurai fighting spirit,
but because as soldiers they have bet
ter clothing, better food and better pay
than they could ever hope to have as
working men. The Japanese soldier
fares not half so we'll as the American
regular. The difference in the condi-
tion of the laboring classes of the two
countries is forcibly illustrated at this
point. The Japanese pray to get into
the army for the good pay--the recruit
| ing officer in the United States has to
beg men to enlist.
A people as poor as this cannot af-
ford even one week of idleness. When
the factories stop in the United States
1t causes much suffering, it is true, but
when they stop in Japan the word suf-
fering does not go far enough; 1t means
starvation.
Many of the wisest men in Japan
believe it was q good thing that the
| boom burst so soon. II it had gone
on for another twelve months 1t would
have involved absolutely the entire
capital of the country and the wreck
would have been complete. That the
crash came before IL was physically inn
possible for some of the people to
get their money up has helped the sit
uation. AS most of the capital that
was invested was borrowed abroad, the
other nations are much interested. But
nevertheless. black as Japan's financial
outlook Is at this time, there Is still
faith. In the face of the panic and
| the government policy of taking over
transportation properties at its own
valuation whenever ii gets good and
ready British company has put up
SIS, 900 900 for an electric railway to be
eighty-three miles long. The dismal
failure of the first great steel making
project in Japan has not deferred other
venturous souls and a new steel COM
pany is about to be perfected with Eng
| lish money actually in sight.
| No nation is more interested in
! Japan's commercial prosperity than
the United States. Ours is the largest
share of it's foreign business, and the
| financial health of the two countries
is closely connected. Japan has shared
our monetary troubles, although in-
| finitely less able to bear them, and 1t
| is certainly to be hoped that she will
share our returning prosperity. But as
yet there is little hope of a speedy re-
covery and the industrial situation in
Japan is extremely gloomy. Private
finances and credit are strained. Pub
| lie finances are in a tangle that is
causing a storm of protest from every
part OF the empire. But that is an
other story. To feel the tragedy of
| the thing as Japanese must feel 1t,
one must imagine himself making
pasteboard boxes for wages of three
! cents for a ten-hour day. Even the
American imagination refuses to work
| for such wages.
Tomorrow-Japanese Business Methods.