Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-09-05
DISTRIBUTING
THE WAR COSTS
Business Men Talk Plainly to
Congressman About Loans
and Taxes

! SDe-td! Correspondence Of the Evening Ledger
WASHINGTON, Sept 4.
LNNpEl;T flnancers talk about bonds and
IL taxes with more gusto than the average
! business man who Is now coming to Con-
! gress with his grievances. And the more
| the grievances the better Congress UNDER
| stands the extent Of the burden which both
bonds and taxes impose upon nation, As
a rule, the expert financer argues for bonds
to put the burden on the future generations
The old-tlme Democrat considers that as
unfair to the man in the trenches, who must
help pay the debt after his fighting is done
He also argues that this method of dis
tributng the war cost means that those
who are making money out OF the war will
he relieved of just proportion OF the taxes
and will have no interest in bringing the
war to "A close, IT Is so much easier to
issue bonds than TO levy and collect taxes
that it Is not necessary to explain why the
effort is being made TO popularize the bond
system. 1t has taken more than three
months TO pass "A So 900, 900 900 tax bill
whereas the first $1,000, ,O00, 600 bond bill
| passed in a day. Even tho legislators would
rather take the path Of least resistance in
matters OF this kind which accounts in
part for the moderately generous reception
of the new and larger bond bill OF the Ad-
ministration.
Everybody knows that what is borrowed
| on bonds has to be paid some day, just as
taxes are paid today. The difference is
that instead of paying the obligation now
1t is passed on to other generations Of tax
payers to pay, principal and interest and
interest" on these new Government obli-
cations Is going TO make the business man
of next year and the year after next and
thereafter sit up and take notice.
Business Men Complain
complaints. not about the loan bills which
are passing the burden along, but about
the 80, 600. 10000 tax bill. which has given
the Senate such trouble and which Is only
| about one-eighth the size of the aggregate
of loans thus far authorized or contem-
plated by this Congress. Says one manu-
facturer:
Il tell you again and again that il q
tax is placed directly on our product II will
not simply disturb our profit but it will
eat our capital and compel us to go to the
wall
we are not alone losing the best men
in our sales and manufacturing department
who are going into the draft in addition
to those who have volunteered before but
our mediocre help is now receiving any,
where from 80 per cent to l2O per cent
more than 1t received two years ago. and
there isn't raw material that we use
that has not advanced more than so per
cent. Take glucose, for which we paid oh
cents, and for which we now pay 6h cents /:
take sugar for which we paid 8 cents and
for which we now pay Sl5 cents.
Il certainly cannot understand the Ad-
ministration.
1T might be good thing to follow up
the fashion and vie with England In pilng
up an impossible national debt. but how
they are going to get the country to carry
such a debt when they tax the minor in
dustries out Of existence, is more than
can understand"
That letter came from New York Here
Is another from large iron manufacturer
near Philadelphia. He complains that the
Government threatens "to boss everything
from the salt on our food to the coal we
cook II with"
'"rhe Civil War, as i remember it," says
this writer "placed the country in a great
| deal worse position than the war in Europe
| does, yet we did not then have commissions
| to supervise everybody and everything
| We are not only creating an army TO fight,
| but a greater one to supervise. III man
| should be taken suddenly III with collie.
| apparently he would have to obtain the
| Governments permission TO obtain a slim.
ulant for his relief and that would 20
hard with the Irish, Joking aside you are
| giving us too many commissions. Lawyers
| to build ships and possibly to direct our
| army In France; experts to regulate prices
| all except labor, which seems 10 be given
a free hand. so long as 1t votes right The
| North Is going to pay the piper for all this
! supervision cf businsss."