Evening star., 1922-06-04
TRADE PRACTICES
|NJURE GERMANY
Harden Raps Gouging Of
Foreigners as Having
Boomerang Effect.
PASSPORT HOLDERS HIT
Extortion From Visitors Has Be
come Systematic, He
Declares.
BY MAMMALIAN HARDEN,
Germany's Leading Publicist.
Cable Dispatch to The Star.

By MAXlMlLIAN HARDEN,
Germany's Leading PubIicist.
By Cable Dispatch to The Star.
BERLIN, June ton
against foreigners is creating in
creased bitter feeling against Ger
many. The present situation is like
that in which a celebrated doctor
sent a woman patient to take the
\ baths at a mineral spa. He gave her
a sealed letter to a doctor there, tell
ing her that it described her symp-
toms. The lady, inclined to hypo-
chrondria. could not resist the oppor-
tunity to learn her true condition.
She opened it to read: Dear Col
league: I am sending you a golden
goose which l have plucked. Do you
likewise"
In many countries today a foreign
passport is regarded as such a letter
describing the bearer as golden
bird which the natives should and
must pluck. Formerly the treatment
or foreigners was a reliable criterion
Of q nations culture and patriotism.
Extortion OF money from visitors
was not required at every turn. Such
abuses were reported in France even
during and after the war. but a regu-
lar system now has developed
throughout Europe which may be
summarized as when we catch peo-
pie from hig gh-exchange countries
they must pay for our low exchange"
In law and morals a person must pay
only for damage of which they are
personally responsible, and certainly
tourist If the dollar buys seventy
times more marks than eight years
ago. nor Is 1t the Swedish globe
trotter's fault II with four crowns in
on crossing the Russian frontier
The reich mark and the soviet ruble
although a new issue of the latter
on May l is worth 10000 Of the old
have inherited only the name and not
the value Of their deceased predeces-
sors.
Exchange Affects Relations.
Making 20 per cent of Europeans.
whose exchange is high, pay for the
sufferings of so per cent whose ex-
change is low. is not only unjust, and
often injurious to their own COM
merce. but degrading to the nations
that permit such unworthy practices
Every week brings me heaps of COM
plants from plucked birds of passage,
mostly half-amused, but many furi-
Gus. Hotel keepers raise prices to
ASdhS Wien the QOlldF rises, DOt
do not lower them when it falls. An
American lands at Bremen and. suf-
fering from seasickness. calls a doc
tor. who prescribes an aspirin tablet
and charges 1000 marks for a ten
minute visit. An Englishman orders
tickets for ball. and the messenger
reports that only boxes are left at
500 marks. When the Englishman
telephones to reserve one the cashier,
hearing the accent, says, ''Oh. an Eng
fG Ghvoo
a place. In some towns theater
tickets are four or five times dearer
to foreigners than to Germans. The
cheaper tickets for the Germans give
admission only when papers are pro-
duced proving nationality; thus the
foreigner cannot avoid the tax by
sending German to buy the tickets
Or course, nobody thinks of refund
Ing the tax when the foreigner prevent
GaImon Cd from going going gives his tickets to a
is approved by most people and
praised as a proper economic defense
Women, unable to afford butter and
sugar for their husbands and chill
dren. become enraged when they
luxuries, as the price is negligible to
them when reckoned in their own
money, and ask why shouldn't they
pay more? Because it is wrong; it is
dishonest to sell the same goods or
cording to the purchasers national
ity. and also because the state treas
ury does not profit from such feec-
ing.
Pays as Foreigner.
Who knows, for instance. that the
envied dollar man did not buy marks
when they were much dearer than
now? I recently met one here who
is very poor but came to claim a small
legacy. Because of his passport he
was obliged to pay foreign prices
everywhere. The same thing hap
pened to a German woman who dur-
ing the war married an English pr1s-
oner and now is suing for her moth
er's estate. Such things occur every
day. Who can assert these extra
prices always go down in the books
of the tax collector? Who can say
that the tailor who charges a foreign
er 10000 marks for a suit of clothing
does not enter it at the German price
of 5000? The door is opened wide to
fraud and helps the generalization
of all business, which is often shady
enough already.
This can be effectively fought only
through diplomatic channels. No
body would object to a high passport
wise fee nor reasonable tax on for
eigners, but everybody complains
against paying four to six times
more Ior tne same article because
their name is Smith instead of Null
ler. We must not slip back into the
days when a foreigner was regarded
as an enemy and fair game for prof.
teering. Only geese submit quietly
to plucking
The belief that the distress of
300 100000 people can be alleviated
by charging a few thousand travellers
enormous prices is just as childish as
the communist muddlehead's demand
that Amschel Rothschild of Frank
fort should divide his fortune with
all. This wise banker, when the de-
mand was made, turned to his cashier