State of German Finances
Sharp criticism was levelled in Parliament and in the press against the extreme slowness with which long overdue taxes were being collected. The slowness in tax collection was partly attributable to the overworked condition of revenue and taxation officials. The sensational drop in the value of the mark due to inflation in the Weimar Republic made the financial position still more deplorable, and produced at the end of the year an unprecedented rise in prices. It also led to a positive inundation of the large western towns with buyers from the countries with high exchange. This resulted in Germany being drained of goods without receiving a fair equivalent. The stimulus given to trade and industry, though it certainly reduced unemployment to a minimum, was no compensation, because the export of manufactures involved a continual decrease of German assets. Eventually, all of these factors would lead to the mark being devalued to as little as 4.2×1012 mark to the United States dollar.
Read more about this topic: 1921 In Germany
Famous quotes containing the words state of, state and/or german:
“If, during his daily walk, he met any children flying kites, playing marbles, or whirling peg tops, he would buy the toys from them and exhort them not to gamble or indulge in vain sport.”
—For the State of Rhode Island, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“President Lowell of Harvard appealed to students ‘to prepare themselves for such services as the Governor may call upon them to render.’ Dean Greenough organized an ‘emergency committee,’ and Coach Fisher was reported by the press as having declared, ‘To hell with football if men are needed.’”
—For the State of Massachusetts, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Sometimes, because of its immediacy, television produces a kind of electronic parable. Berlin, for instance, on the day the Wall was opened. Rostropovich was playing his cello by the Wall that no longer cast a shadow, and a million East Berliners were thronging to the West to shop with an allowance given them by West German banks! At that moment the whole world saw how materialism had lost its awesome historic power and become a shopping list.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)