Evening star., 1938-04-25
among the Govern


the official trade figures show
negligible difference, relatively speak
ing, between exports and imports each
year.
So the $4,000 100000 must have
remained in the United States Where
is it? A study of the figures for bank
deposits show that as between June,
1888, and January, 1888, deposits in
all banks have increased by just about
$l7,500,0 100000. 1t is fair to assume,
therefore, that the money borrowed
from the American people in the form
OF Government bonds and notes has,
to large extent, finally found its way
back to the banks, and there it re-
mains. Some of it. no doubt, is in
the form of surpluses in manufac-
turing enterprises. though the in
crease of surpluses between 1888 and
1885, even including new plants and
machinery, has not been more than
se,O00,000,o00 in all, of which prob
ably a third is in cash. Not all of
this increase could be attributed to
the flow of Government funds, because
a huge investment of capital was
functioning before 1888.
Most of 1t Idle.
The bulk of the pump printing"
money is undoubtedly in the banks
lying idle. There are enough funds
available to start full-fledged pros
perity movement without another dol
lar Of pump printing" The reasons
why this money lies unemployed and
Is not put to work are related to ad-
ministration policies. One of these
policies is a definite program of re-
distribution of income. Expressed in
another way it is policy of depriving
management of incentive and dimin-
lsflng the opportunities of individuals
who are accustomed to take risks with
their capital under our economic sys-
tenn.
Another objective Of the administra-
ton has been to raise labor's share of
the national income But wage pay
ments reached last year SO per cent
OF What they were in our most pros
porous year of 1929, and yet depression
has come.
To sum up: Income has been redis-
triouted more drastically than is gen.
orally imagined The so-called in
vestor class, which usually puts money
to work in enterprises that make Jobs
the job creators of America-are
AFRAID to take risks for fear of what
the Roosevelt administration will do,
or else the bank deposits are in such
small amounts that no machinery for
mobllizing these little sums into a
steady flow of capital for durable goods
has been permitted to develop. For
this the administration may possibly
thank the securities and exchange
law, which, while excellent in cutting
out fraud. has been even more effective
as a means of choking the channels
OF investment.
Proof of Redistribution.
Very little new money has gone into
capital loans in recent years. Most of
the bond issues foated were used to
refund or renew previously existing
debt. We normally have been ac-
customed each year to float S4,0OO,-
100000 of bonds and stocks for new
and jobs. We issue hardly
any new capital nowadays.
What proof, it will be asked, is there
that redistribution of income-a New
Deal objective-noW has been accom-
plished? I compiled from the Bureau
of Internal Revenue figures a classi-
ficatlon by groups. 1t shows that the
people with incomes between 81 1000
and $4,000 a year were 3,O65, 7O1 in
1929. All of them together had a net
income of $685., 100000 in 1929. But
in 1896 there were s4795,573 persons
in the same income group and their
total net income had gone up to SILL
649, ,O33, 900.
Certainly no better evidence of the
participation of the lower
Income groups in the national income
could be given, and there is no doubt
that the same thing must have been
to the people below 81 900 q
year, though perhaps not in the same
scale.
But if the trend in the groups from
81 1000 to $4,000 year has been rising
decidedly so that it is above what
1t was in 1929, what has been hap
pening during the same period to the
persons in the millionaire class? Back
in 1929 the official figures show that
there were 504 persons in the United
States with an income of $1,OOO,OOO
a year or over, and their total net
income was $1,185, $4,000.
Income Not Increased.
Yet in the latest year for which
figures are available. namely 1895,
the number of persons with incomes
Of $1.000,000 year had risen from a
low point of 33 in 1884 to 81 in 1896,
and the total net income of these 81
persons was only $130,835, 900, which
is quite drop from the net income
Of more than one billion dollars q
& II .}ES# VxX$Ik II n