Currency question -- Great Britain; Finance -- Great Britain; World War, 1914-1918 -- Economic aspects -- Great Britain
In the other article on the subject of post-war debt contributed to
the last number of this Journal, an "Ex-M.P." plumped for a somewhat
novel variety of the Levy on Capital, in the shape of a Compulsory
Loan, bearing no interest and repayable in 100 years. Each individual
citizen to be made to subscribe to the extent of 20 per cent. of
his possessions. Ten per cent. of the amount due to be paid on
application, 10 per cent. six months after allotment, and 80 per cent.
on January 1st of the following year. When desired, the Government to
advance at 5 per cent. the money necessary for the payment subsequent
to allotment, full repayment of such advances to be made within
eight years. A Sinking Fund to be established to redeem the loan at
maturity. But is there any real advantage in this scheme over the Levy
on Capital, from which it only differs by the receipt by the payer of
a promise to repay in 100 years' time? The approximate value of
£1000 nominal of the Compulsory Loan stock would be, according to
"Ex-M.P.'s" calculation, in the year of issue £7 12s., money being
worth 5 per cent. and assuming that rate to be current during the
remainder of the term. The claim that there is no confiscation,
because "a perfectly good security is given for the money received,"
would seem rather futile to those who paid £1000 and received a
security, the present value of which might be below £10. They might
very likely think that outright confiscation (since confiscation
originally means nothing but "putting into the Treasury") is really a
simpler way of dealing with the problem. "Ex-M.P.," however, estimates
that the immediate redemption of £2800 millions of debt (which he,
rather modestly, expects to be the result of his 20 per cent. levy)
would enable the balance of the War Debt to be converted into 3-1/2
per cent. stock. This may be true, but if so it is equally true if a
similar or larger amount of debt is cancelled by means of an outright
Levy on Capital.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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