IN 1925, Russia had been through a devastating war and a violent internal revolution. Her currency had been destroyed in a runaway price inflation, she was the world’s worst financial risk abroad and she had very little gold. Yet by the end of the first Five Year Plan in 1933, Russia had invested some 60 billion rubles in factories, new cities, cities, hydroelectric developments, armaments, houses, schools. There stood the new plant, ugly and solid. Without it Russia could never have met the onslaught of Hitler’s armies.
Where did the money come from?
In 1933 it was freely prophesied that Italy could not invade Ethiopia. She had no credit abroad and almost no gold. The effort would bankrupt her. Italy went ahead, conquered Ethiopia, and emerged without financial collapse.
Where did the money come from?
Hitler took over a Germany which was technically bankrupt. It had defaulted on its foreign obligations. When he proposed to build a powerful army, together with all kinds of grandiose public works, he was laughed at in London and New York. Germany was insolvent, and the whole idea was preposterous. The nations of Europe which have trembled under the thunder of panzer divisions know that Hitler built even more terribly than he promised.
Where did the money come from?
When Japan began to rattle her sword in the direction of Indo-China and challenge the United States and the British Empire, wiseacres said it was a bluff. The long years of the war in China had reduced the Japanese economy to a bag of bones. She was bankrupt and could not sustain a real fight. Yet she opened a new attack with devastating fury, and with military equipment in planes, tanks, artillery, ships, that was as excellent as it was unexpected.
Where did the money come from?
In 1939, the United States Congress declined to appropriate $4 billions for highways, conservation, hospitals, freight cars, in the bitterly contested “lend-spend” bill. It was widely held that the bill would lead to ruin and national bankruptcy. Yet since the fall of France in 1940, Congress has appropriated almost $300 billions for armaments–seventy-five times as much as the lend-spend bill–and a large fraction of it has already gone into tanks and guns. Far from being ruined, our national vitality has never been more vigorous, and great financial moguls assure us that we shall be able to swing the national debt.
Where did the money come from?
After the war America will need to maintain full employment, operate its industries at substantial capacity, provide the essentials of life for all its own citizens, and help foreign peoples who are starving and unable to pay for the supplies. There will be a towering political demand for a world delivered from chronic depression.
Where will the money come from?
The best part is here:
It is clear from these examples that what a great nation can “afford” in periods of crisis depends not on its money but on its man power and its goods. Russia, Italy, Germany, Japan, the United States, all used money in the situations mentioned, but money was obviously not the dominant factor. Man power and materials were the dominant factor. Yet at other times, when crisis was not so acute, the money for necessary tasks could not be found. Unemployment, insecurity, want, dragged on. This is a puzzling paradox. At certain times a nation can afford what at other times, with no less money, it cannot afford. At certain times we are afraid of national bankruptcy, and at other times we give it hardly a thought.
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Excerpt from “Where’s the Money Coming From?” by Stuart Chase, 1943, p. 1-
