The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 14, 1925, Page 9

TOWARDS A NEW ENTENTE The Quest for “ibe Markets and the Export of Capital. ‘HE victory of the republicans in America was, as we already wrote in an article regarding the issue of the American elections, the conse- quence of the improvement in the fa- vorable combination of circumstances obtaining in the summer and autumn. It, in turn, gave a fresh impetus to- wards the further improvement of the conjuncture. One of the American democrat journals, that. is, belonging to. the winning party, writes on this occasion: “Not in the .memory of this generation has a president satin the White House in whom the finan- cial interests of the country have had more confidence than President Cool- idge.” The reasons for. this confi- dence are very clearly expressed in a trading circular issued by the Ameri- can firm of Goodbody & Co: It states: “The business community rejoices for the ‘following’ reasons: ** 1; Because radicalism, if not dead, is #¢otched for at’ least’ ‘three years. 2: Because the appéal to the ‘poorer classes has pro- duced. but insignificant results politi- cally. 3. Because the election demon- strated anew that the labor vote is not controlled by the labor unions. 4. Because the railroads are expected to be free from adverse legislation for several years. 5. Because the feder- al reserve banks will be unmolested for several years, at least. 6. Be- cause the tariff will not be tinkered with by unfriendly hands. 7. Be- cause the election restored confidence and removed obstructions to industry and trade.” (“Literary Digest” for the 29th of November.) In short, the capitalist world having secured its own government, which will be its blind tool, has got down to business. A few basic figures will show what this industrial prosperity in America looks like. The stock exchange has been disposing of over 2,000,000 shares per day, and has started 565 industrial and trading concerns. This is the highest. figure since the year 1896. Clearing operations amounted in Oc- tober to $40,000,000,000. This again is a high figure, the highest since March, 1920. Along the whole line we have a decrease in the number of bankrupts, an increase in freightage. And while the steel industry at the first of July was busy to 46 per cent below its nor- mal, this figure had increased before the first of November by 14 per cent. The prices on steel are growing. The fundamental cause of this boom is the high prices on bread, caused by the bad harvest in Canada and Rus- sia. Wheat prices have reached one dollar 62 cents. In one or two jour- nals the question is already being raised of whether they have to deal with the temporary surmounting of an economic depression or with the be- ginning of an immense industrial boom. It is of course quite under- standable that this question cannot be answered theoretically. The capital- ists believe what they want to believe, and it is a long time now since we have seen the American bourgeoisie in such an exultant mood as they are at present. The immense amount of capital ac- cumulated in America is not only seeking fresh markets for the dispos- al of American industrial goods but ig likewise looking for direct markets to which it may export its capital. Last year London issued securities to to the value of 2,000,000,000 rubles; 38 per cent British, 41 per cent col- onials, 21 per cent foreign. The Unit- ed States of America exported capital abroad to the value of 1,200,000,000 rubles, last year. During the first ten months of this year London issued 1,- 400,000,000 rubles worth of securities, of which 300,000,000 rubles worth of these went abroad, while during the same period New York issued securi- ties to the value of 5,000,000,000 rubles and there went abroad more than 2,- 000,000,000 rubles. Thus, we see that American financial capital has left British capital behind in the quest for markets to which to export capi- tal. Very important is the fact that this exported capital is to be found not only in the hands of a few banks or financial magnates but that various loans find subscribers in the ranks of the petty and middle bourgeoisie. The Austrian loan of 50,0000,000 rubles got 900,000 subscribers, while the Japan- ese loan of 300,000,000 rubles found 44,000 subscribers. The low’ percent- age paid by the American banks has broken “the fear of the unknown” among the members of the petty and middle bourgeoisie and every year sees more of their money being placed abroad. It is very interesting to throw even a cursory glance at the places absorb- ing American exported capital. Dur- ing the course of the first ten months of 1924, the United States of America lent the Argentine 80,000,000 rubles, Japan 300,000,000 rubles, Switzerland 60,000,000 rubles, Holland 80,000,000 rubles, Czecho-Slovakia nearly 20,000,- 000 rubles, Hungary 18,000,000 rubles, Norway 50,000,000 rubles, Belgium 60,000,000 rubles, Canada 280,000,000 rubles, Germany 220,000,000 rubles, France 200,000,000 rubles, besides floating a number of municipal and private loans. No wonder that the newly elected president of the United States, Coolidge, declared: ‘We can- not hope that we will always be an island of fortunate ones living far from the rest of humanity. If we were unable to avoid participation in the world war, whose causes had nothing to do with us (!), how then can we think that we will evade responsibility for other world questions, which must be solved in an atmosphere of peace and good will.” Let us set aside Mr. Coolidge’s “peace and good will.” In further ar- ticles we see how this “good will” is finding its expression in plans for maneuvers, in agitation for increased armaments, etc., etc. The American president, put into power by a party which in 1920 defeated Wilson under the slogan of isolation from the rest of the world, expresses in these words the fact that American capital has al- ready penetrated into all countries of the world, this fact being today one of the main driving. forces, iniweriad politics. At the present -time the American newspapers are full of ar- ticles devoted to the trade of Ameri- ca thruout the world, the export of capital and all the other conflicting questions of world politics. This is a change which can only be concretely conceived of by those who followed up America’s attitude to world ques- tions in the period from 1919 to 1922. Having preserved its own industry from the attacks of world competition with the help of an unusually high tariff wall, the United States of Amer- ica are competing to an ever increas- ing degree with all the other coun- tries of the world, and are utilizing for the purpose of carrying on this competition their own accumulated capital, the export of which represents nothing other than a powerful instru- ment for the granting of long term credits, a thing America has hitherto been very unwilling to do. While the export of capital at pres- ent as a burning question, occupies the first place in America, in England the first place is occupied by the ques- tion of increasing the export of goods. In a recently published work “The Economic Position of England in the World,” Edgar Crammond, the statis- tician, calculates that as a result of the war the British national income has considerably decreased. If the corresponding figures be cumpared with the altered purcnasing power of money, we find that while in 1914 Bri- tain had a national income of 24 mil- liard rubles, today she has only 21 milliards; it has sunk approximately to the national income of 1907. Added to this decreased national income, there is the heavy burden of a con- siderably increased public debt, lead- ing to the quadrupling of the budget. It is for this reason that Britain, which in 1907 could use nearly 24 per cent of its national income in extend- ing its capital abroad and at home, can now use no more than nearly 10 per cent, that is, almost two milliard rubles. It has already been pointed out here that of these two milliard rubles, 38 per cent was disposed of in Britain itself, 41 per cent in the colo- nies, and only 21 per cent abroad. Not being in a position to compete with America in the export of capital, that is to say, in the granting of long term credits for the gaining of mar- kets, and not having such a large home market as America, which would per mit the lowering of the cost of production, and suffering from the ef- fects of the industrialization of its own colonies, British capitalism finds itself confronted with a much more serious difficulty than does American capitalism. The afore-mentioned sta- tistician, Crammond, reckons that in comparison with the year 1912, when 13.8 per cent-of the world’s trade fell to Britain’s share, she had managed to get 17.3 per cent in 1922. But this increase in the percentage of Britain’s world trade (principally at the cost of squeeze out Germany) did not an- swer to the increase of the sum of British trade. It was, on the con- trary, lower by 25 per cent than in 1912. The necessity for the establish- ing of conditions for normal trade was the cause of Britain’s participation in the attempts at solving the reparation question. It.is the cause of Britain’s endeavoring to re-establish, no matter what comes, firm rule in.her colonies, to pacify China in her own way and to open the Russian market. And since both for the import of capital and for the export of goods it is neces- sary to consolidate the capitalist or- der thruout the whole world. The whole of 1924 was a period of Anglo- American co-operation. The comparative weakness of Brit- ain in the matter of the export of cap- ital, her closer relationship to the European market, her greater depend- ence on its ocmpetition, as causing profound disquiet to the English capi- talists, as far as those difficulties are concerned which would face British capitalism if German industry were to be consolidated.. By KARL RADEK A whole number of vital questions with regard to the rehabilitation of capitalism therefore confront the United States in another form than for England; for example, there is the question of the relation of Britain and America to the question of the steel trust and the question of the allied debts. These differences: likewise show the different degree of the in- terestedness of Britain and America in colonial questions. Notwithstand- ing all the reverential compliments of the British statesmen to the United States of America, Anglo-American co-operation has not lead to the dis- appearance of the most profound con- tradictions. But meanwhile account must be taken of the fact that the increasing efforts, due to the super- fluity of strength of American capital and the profounl crisis of British cap- italism, to establish, no matter what comes, a market for their goods and the export of capital in badly shaken up Europe, in the colonies and the semi-colonial countries, are creating not only solidarity. between these powers with regard to the Soviet, So- cialist Union, the colonial. and semi- colonial ‘peoples, but likewise ~en- deavor to obtain favorable conditions for the penetration into these coun- tries of British and American capital as speedily as possible, American imperialism is endeavor- ing to gain the world, British im- perialism is endeavoring to gain the world, British imperialism is en- deavoring to hold what it has already gained. In the future they must come into conflict with one another. But be that as it may, they are at present compelled to extend the world at all costs. These endeavors of theirs form the chief feature of the international position at the end of the year 1924, ART AND INDUSTRY By H, C. FILLMORE, articles in last week’s' maga- zine. supplement of the DAILY WORKER arouse great interest in me. I think we have here material for contrast worthy of study. One article is “The Stockyards,’ by John Lassen, the other Comrade Zin- oviev’s speech to the worker news- paper correspondents in Moscow. Of course, we xnow that Pravda, which is Russia’s “DAILY WORKER,” is making great efforts to secure for publication an ever greater number of letters written by just workers, that is, by men and women who have no intellectual training as yet, but who will write from the job itself, just how everything on the job looks to those who are doing it. 'HE real worker's point of view is considered to be very important over there in Soviet Russia and a great increase in the number and en- thusiasm of these worker-reporters is linked right up with an amazing ex- tension of the paper’s circulation. Comrade Zinoviev says: “The worker’s correspondents form in a way the guard of our fortresses, the shops. Wherever they work their task is to describe conditions of work and the life of the workers AS IT REALLY IS, In western countries by contagion the labor press is be- ginning- really to ‘workerize’ itself. The Bolshevik is above all a man of the masses. The Leninist knows how to speak to the masses.” F course a Leninist knows how “to speak to the masses,” and why? Obviously because he is part and parcel of the masses, not some- thing distinct and set apart. Let us never forget the significance of the Russian Communist Party at different times sending great numbers of their officials and administrative workers back to the factories and other jobs to become “re-workerized.” HAVE chosen Comrade Lassen’s article in contrast to this because it seems to me more than anything else in recent months to show a dif- ferent method of news gathering and writing; it may be art, surely, there ‘| is enough blood, and dung, and stink, and terrible weariness in it to cause some sensation even in a hardened person, and I catch myself thinking, “This is all right now,,it shows what. impression the. stockyardg:; made.,an. the author.” O be consistent he had ought to be a vegetarian for a while now. But how does all this appear to the work- er out there who can’t “flee” but has to stay and be a part of all this. This is what I'd like to know and I wish some stock yards worker would tell us thru the columns of the DAILY WORKER. ORKERS! Let us not bow down before the high art of the” in- tellectuals, but put our point of view before the public, now that we have @ great newspaper of OUR VERY OWN that is willing and anxious to publish our experiences. Let us make ourselves heard. Let us help to WORKERIZE our newspaper. Altho we are green and raw and this busi- ness of writing may be new, let us~ show the working world that we are not dumbbells. PITTSBURGH, PA. To those who work hard for their money, | will save 50 per cent on all their dental work. DR. RASNICK DENTIST 645 Smithfield Street. Telephone Monroe 2284 Genova Restaurant ITALIAN-AMERICAN 1238 Madison Street N. E. Cor, Elizabeth St. Badadbes > © > ignan Our Special Arrangements for Parties on Short Notice LEARN ESPERANTO The Internativnal Language The following ied are recelved ree: Esperanto for All, grammar and vocabulary. Esperanto and its Critics, by Prof. Collinson. WORKERS’ ESPERANTO ASSN., 525 7th St., Rockford, til.