New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1916-08-17

have had the kind of prosperity we
are rolling in if we had not given
the credit. and if we want to keep
that prosperity we shall have to go
on giving the credit. We have
charged high prices for the goods
and we have taken care to have tine
security for the credit advanced. We
loaned at first on the unsecured
notes of England and France. Now
we lend only on notes secured by col
lateral.
The borrowers are not in the least
obliged to us politically, morally or
sentimentally. 1t is true that to be
able to obtain goods on credit from
Us has been vital to them, whereas to
sell the goods was not vital to us.
But their necessity has been our OPP
portunity, and we have made much
of it. This they know. They begin
even to resent it. The American
Express Company, in its valuable
Foreign Trade Bulletin, has just
said:
Recent reports from foreign buy
ers of American products indicate
a strong feeling of discomfort over
the excessively advanced prices for
American manufactured goods,
which such buyers have been com
PEELED by war conditions to pur-
chase in the United States. This
feeling has made itself apparent in
numerous instances coming to the
attention of our British and Cont
mental Offices within the past sixty
days, and has been supported by
the invariable argument that the
advanced costs Of raw materials
arc not sufficient to explain the
alleged excessive increase in sell
ing prices on American products
of foreign consumption.
Waving the question whether or
not such feeling is fair or warrant
ed. it is important to consider that it
exists. 1t is more likely to increase
than diminish, as prices are more
likely to rise than to fall so long as
the war demand continues. One may
argue that it should be so, on the
ground that the more rapidly the
cost of war advances toward the pro-
hibitive point the sooner it will end,
but that is for The present aside.
Let us consider what we are do
ing. We are making great business
of an opportunity arising from the
blood necessities Of Europe. We are
taking her into our debt at the rate
of above two billion dollars a year.
We are wallowing in prosperity.
There is perhaps not household
among 20,000,000 that does not feel
it in some degree. And yet. at the
same time, we are pursuing fatu-
Gus course toward a future filled
with uncertainties.
Our war customers, under the
lead Of Great Britain, are laying
plans for their own economic future
which bode no good for US. With
the exclusive power to produce and
sell on credit the goods which Eu-
rope requires for war we do abso-
lutely nothing to protect our own in
terests in post-bellum trade, though
Great Britain and her Allies are
openly arranging an economic pact
by which they shall be bound to pre-
fer trade with themselves TO the eX-
clusion of others so far as possible.
The highest commercial and finan-
cial intelligence of England now is
occupied in designing beforehand the
ways and means by which all the
power of Great Britain and her Al
lies shall be used to further their
trade in the world after the end Of
the war. The cry Empire First" is
raised in all British dominions. Bar
riers will be erected against non
cllied trade. Special means of ac-
cess to other peoples markets will
have been devised.
When the war is over our power
will be gone. We shall have the best
market in the world on which to sell
and the poorest on which to buy. Be-
sides having to meet the purely eco